Daf Ditty Moed Katan 25: Kiss of Death

Testament and Death of Moses, 1482

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 Mary Oliver

MISHNA: Mourners do not rend their garments during the intermediate days of a Festival and
do not remove their garments from their shoulders. And others do not provide them with a meal
[mavrin] after the burial, except for close relatives of the deceased. And the consolers provide
the first meal after the burial only while the mourner is sitting on an upright bed, and not on one
that is overturned.

GEMARA: The mishna teaches that only the relatives of the deceased rend their clothes. The
Gemara asks: And is this the case even if the deceased was a Torah Sage? But isn’t it taught
otherwise in a baraita: When a Torah scholar dies, everyone is his relative?

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The Gemara clarifies: Does it enter your mind to say that everyone is his relative? Rather, this
baraita should be understood as follows: Everyone is considered to be like his relative in the
sense that everyone rends his garment in anguish over him, and everyone bares his shoulder
over him in mourning, and everyone eats the mourner’s meal over him in the public square
as mourners do. The death of a Torah scholar is a personal loss for every Jew. So why is the mishna
limited to only relatives? The Gemara answers: No, it is necessary for the mishna to teach this
halakha in a case where the deceased is not a Torah scholar.

The Gemara asks: And if the deceased was an upright person who feared Heaven and performed
good deeds, then aren’t all those present at his death obligated to rend their garments over his
death? As it is taught in a baraita: For what reason do a person’s sons and daughters die when
they are young? They die so that he will cry and mourn over the death of an upright person.

The Gemara questions the formulation: They die so that he will cry and mourn? Is security, i.e.,
his children, taken from him in advance to ensure that in the future he will mourn over the death
of an upright person? Rather the baraita means as follows: His children died because he did not
cry or mourn over an upright person who died. As with regard to anyone who cries and
mourns over an upright person who died, they forgive him for all his transgressions because
of the honor he accorded to the deceased. If this is the case, one also rends his clothes over an
upright person. The Gemara answers: Rather, the mishna is referring only to one who was not an
upright person.

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The Gemara challenges: But if one was standing there at the time of the soul’s departure, i.e.,
at the time of death, he is also obligated to rend his clothes. As it is taught in a baraita: Rabbi
Shimon ben Elazar says: One who stands over the deceased at the time of the soul’s departure
is obligated to rend his clothes. To what may this be likened? To a Torah scroll that is burned,
for which anyone present is obligated to rend his clothes.

The Gemara answers: The mishna must be referring to a person who was not standing there at
the time of the soul’s departure but who heard that someone who is not a close relative died, and
the deceased was neither a Torah scholar nor an upright person.

Summary1

They do not rend [their clothes] or bare [their shoulders], or provide a meal [for the
mourners] except for the relatives of the dead.

And they do not provide a meal except on an upright couch.

They do not bring [food] to the house of mourning on an [ornamental] tray, platter, or flat
basket, but in plain baskets.

And they do not say the mourners’ blessing during the festival.

But they may stand in a row and comfort [the mourners] and [the mourners] may formally
dismiss the community. Section one: When one heard that a close relative had died, one
would rend whatever clothes they were wearing. Baring the shoulder was also a sign of
mourning.

The mourner was provided by the community with the first meal after the funeral. On Hol
Hamoed only a close relative would perform these practices. Others would not. I should note
that today only close relatives do these actions in any case. The circle of mourners was bigger
in the Talmudic period.

1
https://www.sefaria.org/Moed_Katan.24b.12?lang=bi&p2=Mishnah_Moed_Katan.3.7&lang2=bi&w2=English%20Explanation
%20of%20Mishnah&lang3=en

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Section two: It was customary to overturn the bed during mourning and then sit on the bed
as a sign of mourning. But one does not overturn the bed during Hol Hamoed. This practice
fell into disuse sometime after the Talmudic period. Section three: This halakhah is true in
all cases.

When bringing food to the mourner, they should bring it in plain baskets. A source in the
Talmud relates that originally people would use fancy silver and gold vessels, but poor people
would be embarrassed that they could not afford such fancy funerals and mourning homes.

As a response the rabbis decreed that everyone must bring in a simple vessel. The mourning
home is not a place where one should be showing off one’s wealth. Section four:

The mourners’ blessing was stated on return from burial. They would stand in a line and
comfort the mourner with this blessing. It may have also been recited at other points as well.
But it is a public sign of mourning and should not be done on Hol Hamoed. Section five:
While the blessing is not recited on Hol Hamoed, burial is.

Along with the burial, they may have the formal line of comforters that would accompany
the mourners on their way home. The same goes true for the official words that the mourner
seems to have said to the comforters, to allow them to go home without accompanying the
mourner all the way home.

Today’s Mishnah discusses mourning practices not observed during Hol Hamoed. It is interesting
to note that this Mishnah is one of the main sources of the laws of mourning. It seems, at least to
me, that the Mishnah did not feel it was necessary to teach people how to mourn. People just knew
what to do. The only reason they are mentioned is to let people know when not to observe these
practices.

How to Honour Torah Scholars After They Have Died

Upright people, those who have not committed grave sins or avoided mitzvot, should be honoured
upon their deaths.2 We rend our clothing for them, thought they do not have to know any Torah -
even Torah scholars.

Torah scholars are the royalty; the movie stars of our Jewish past. Everyone is to rend our clothing
for them, for they were like our parents. The remainder of amud (a) is devoted to stories about how
rabbis are honoured in their deaths.

Rabbis did not rend their clothing for Rabbi Safra, for they thought him to be less of a scholar than
others. Rabbi Safra would travel with business. A scholar of halacha but not aggada or Bible, the
rabbis were not certain that the presence of his name in their learning made him worthy as a

2
http://dafyomibeginner.blogspot.com/2014/09/moed-katan-25-how-to-honour-torah.html

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scholar. Of course, Rabbi Safra was an upright man! Wasn't that enough to warrant rent
clothing? Alas, the rabbis discussed this too late in the process and missed the opportunity to show
honour for Rabbi Safra by rending their clothing.

Rabbi Huna did not agree with the opinion that a Torah scroll should sit on a person's
bed. Following his death, some rabbis wanted to honour Rabbi Huna by placing a Torah on a bier
with him. The Gemara notes the procession that followed Rabbi Huna's coffin as it travelled from
place to place. The skeleton must be intact for such demonstrations of respect to be permitted.

We are told a fantastical tale about Rabbi Huna's burial next to two scholars who rose from the
grave in flames when Rabbi Huna's coffin approached. Though Rabbi Chagga left the coffin and
ran, he left it in a standing position where Rabbi Huna could protect himself [sic], and so this
behaviour was considered reasonable.

When a Torah scroll is burned, the letters detach themselves from the parchment and float to
heaven. Similarly, our souls float to heaven when we die. Thus people and Torah scrolls are
considered to be similar; holy containers for their content.

Amud (b) shares famous eulogies. Beautiful words and fascinating stories are shared. Magical
stories of revenge are plentiful, too. Rav Ashi's displeasure in how some rabbis will eulogize
Ravina is so great that their feet become crooked.

A number of surreal 'natural' events are associated with the death of great scholars - storms,
destruction, etc. The poetic language used to describe and honour rabbis following their deaths
seems motivated both by grief and by pressure. It is clear that rabbis are judged harshly based on
the eulogies that they present to honour other rabbis. In this powerful, close-knit community, it is
critical to be respectful of others at all times.

Rav Avrohom Adler writes:3

The Mishna states: Only a mourner of a close relative may rend his garments, reveal their shoulders
or get served the mourner’s meal. The mourner’s meal is served on an upright bed (the people who
are comforting the mourner).

The Gemora states that the laws discussed in the Mishna apply to a Torah scholar that passes away,
as well. The Gemora asks: The halacha is that we rend our garments on the loss of a righteous
person, as well; it is written in a braisa: One who cries and mourns over a righteous person will
have all his sins forgiven; why does the Mishna state the halacha of rending garment only by a
close relative? The Gemora answers: The Mishna is referring to a case where the deceased was
3
http://dafnotes.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/10/Moed_Katan_25.pdf

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not a righteous person. The Gemora qualifies the Mishna further: The Mishna is referring to a case
where the people were not there at the time the soul departed, for otherwise, they would be
obligated to rend their garments.

When Rav Huna departed, they intended to place a sefer Torah on his bier (as if to say: He has
fulfilled what was written here). Rav Chisda said to them: Shall we now act against his will? Has
not Rav Tachlifha said: I once observed when Rav Huna wanted to sit down on a cot on which a
sefer Torah was lying, and he turned over a pitcher on the ground, placing the sefer Torah on it
and only then did he sit down? It is evident that he was of the opinion that one must not sit on a
cot on which a sefer Torah is placed? When the bier was to be removed from the house, they
realized that it could not pass through the door; and they intended to remove it through the roof
opening.

Rav Chisda said to them: We have a tradition from Rav Huna that the proper respect for a deceased
Torah scholar demands that he be removed through the door opening. They then wanted to place
him on a bier of smaller dimensions, but Rav Chisda again remarked: We have a tradition from
him that the proper respect for a deceased Torah scholar demands that he be removed in the first
bier he was placed on. They broke open the doorway, and passed him through.

Rabbi Abba began the following eulogy: Our teacher was worthy that the Heavenly Presence
should rest upon him, but the fact that he resided in Bavel prevented it. (The Gemora asks from
Yechezkel who received prophecy outside Eretz Yisroel. The Gemora answers that this was an
exception to the rule or that he was initially in Eretz Yisroel.) When his corpse arrived in Eretz
Yisroel, Rabbi Ami and Rabbi Assi were informed that Rav Huna had arrived. They said (under
the impression that he was alive): When we were in Bavel, we could not raise our heads on account
of him (we were embarrassed of ourselves on the account of his great learning), and now he has
followed us here. They were then told: His coffin has arrived. Rabbi Ami and Rabbi Assi went out
(to accompany the coffin). Rabbi Aila and Rabbi Chanina remained behind (they continued their
studying). Others, however, said that only Rabbi Chanina remained. What was the reason of those
who went out?

The Gemora cites a braisa: When a coffin is being removed from one place to another, those
present must form a row and must pronounce the mourning benediction and the words of
consolation. The reason, however, of those who did not go out is from the following braisa: When
a coffin is being removed from one place to another, those present need not form a row and they
are not required to pronounce the mourning benediction and the words of consolation.

The Gemora asks: These two braisos contradict each other? The Gemora answers: One braisa
refers to a case where the skeleton is still intact; the other where it does not. Rav Huna's skeleton
was still intact but they were not aware of that. They then began to deliberate where to bury him
and they concluded to place him alongside of Rabbi Chiya. They said: Rav Huna disseminated
Torah as much as Rabbi Chiya. The question arose: Who should enter Rabbi Chiya’s crypt in order
to bury Rav Huna? Rabbi Chaga said to them: I will do it, for I was an established student at the
age of eighteen. I never experienced a seminal emission, and I have served Rabbi Chiya and know
his deeds. It once happened that one of his tefillin straps turned over without him realizing and he
fasted forty days because of it. Rabbi Chaga brought in the coffin into the crypt, he noticed that

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Yehudah, Rabbi Chiya’s older son was lying at the right of his father and Chizkiyah, Rabbi Chiya’s
younger son at his left. He heard Yehudah say to his brother: Rise, for it would not be proper for
Rav Huna to stand and wait to be buried. When Chizkiyah arose, a pillar of fire arose with him.
Rabbi Chaga became frightened, lifted up the coffin of Rav Huna to protect himself from the fire
and then left the crypt.

When Rabbah bar Huna and Rav Hamnuna died in Bavel, they were brought on camels to Eretz
Yisroel. They came to a narrow bridge, where the two camels could not pass at once, the camels
remained standing. An Ishmaelite merchant was surprised and asked the sages to explain to him
why the camels stopped. They told him: Each of the deceased wishes to respect the other and let
him go first. The merchant said: My opinion is that Rabbah bar Huna should have preference
because his father was Torah scholar, as well. He had hardly concluded his remarks when the
camel bearing Rabbah bar Huna passed the bridge. As a punishment for not paying proper respect
to Rav Hamnuna, the molars and front teeth of the Ishmaelite fell out.

The Gemora quotes two eulogies which were said in honor of Rabbah bar Huna and Rav Hamnuna.

Rav Ashi asked Bar Papik the eulogizer: What will you say about me when I die? He replied: I
will say: If upon cedar trees a flame has fallen, what shall the hyssops of the wall do? A Livyasan
was lifted from the sea with a fishhook; what shall the small fry do? Into a rushing stream dryness
descended; what shall the stagnant pond waters do?

Another eulogizer, named Bar Avin, said to Bar Kipuk: Heaven forbid that a fishhook or a flame
should be used in orations over the righteous. Bar Kipuk asked Bar Avin: What, then, would you
say? Bar Avin replied: I would say: Weep for the mourners but not for the lost (deceased), for he
is destined to go to Gan Eden and the mourners will be left sighing. Rav Ashi felt discouraged (for
one eulogizer used the words fishhook and flame and the other used the word lost, when in fact
the soul of the righteous is not lost at all), and as a result, their feet became inverted. When Rav
Ashi died, neither of these eulogizers came to eulogize him.

This is what Rav Ashi meant when he said: Neither Bar Kipuk nor Bar Avin are fit to perform the
ceremony of chalitzah. (since the Gemora Yevamos 103a states that those who have inverted feet
are not fit to perform chalitzah).

Our Gemora states that at Rav Huna’s funeral, R’ Abba began a Hesped, saying that if not for the
fact that Rav Huna had lived in Bavel (outside Eretz Yisroel, which is deemed permanently tamei),
the Shechinah would have undoubtedly rested upon him.

Rav Chisda’s son asked, doesn’t the verse say that Yechezkel received prophecy in Kasdim? Rav
Chisda answered: since Yechezkel had begun his prophecies in Eretz Yisroel, the Shechinah
remained with him when he went to Kasdim.

The Zohar states that the presence of Yosef’s coffin in Egypt ensured that Bnei Yisroel would be
able to survive the bondage. But how could Yosef, who had so withstood tests, be subjected to the
Tum’ah of an Egyptian burial?

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The Zohar answers that we see how Yechezkel continued to enjoy the Shechinah while in the land
of Kasdim on the river Kevar. Since he was by the river, and water of Chutz LaAretz does not
become tamei like the land of Chutz LaAretz, Yechezkel was able to retain the Shechinah.

As such, Yosef was also protected from tumah by being sunk in the Nile.

The verse says that the well of Lechai Roi was situated between Kadesh and Bored. The Targum
says that these were also known as Rekem and Chegra. The Mishna (Gittin 2a) indicates that
Rekem and Cheger were Chutz LaAretz, thus requiring one who delivered a bill of divorce from
there to say he had witnessed its writing and signing. As such, how could an angel appear before
Hagar in the vicinity of Lechai Roi which was Chutz LaAretz, if the Shechinah does not rest on
anyone in Chutz LaAretz?

The Ramas Shmuel suggests that for this reason, the verse took pains to identify exactly where the
angel appeared to Hagar, since the Shechinah can appear even in Chutz LaAretz, near water.

POSITIONING RAV HUNA'S COFFIN UPRIGHT

Rav Mordechai Kornfeld writes:4

The Gemara describes how Rav Chaga brought Rav Huna's coffin into the burial cave in which
Rebbi Chiya and his sons, Yehudah and Chizkiyah, were buried. When Chizkiyah arose to make
room for Rav Huna, a terrifying pillar of fire appeared. Rav Chaga, in his fright, erected the coffin
of Rav Huna in an upright position and fled the burial cave. The Gemara adds that "the reason why
he was not punished was because he positioned the coffin of Rav Huna in an upright position."

What does the Gemara mean when it says that Rav Chaga was not punished for this reason? On
the contrary, he should have been punished for placing Rav Huna's coffin in such a disrespectful
position. (Leaving the deceased in an upright position is disrespectful to the deceased, as the
Gemara says in Bava Basra 101b.)

RASHI here (and RASHI KESAV YAD) implies that Rav Chaga stood up Rav Huna's coffin in
front of him so that the pillar of fire would not harm him.

However, to protect oneself with the coffin of the deceased is also disrespectful. Why did it serve
to protect him?

The BEN YEHOYADA explains that Rav Chaga did not attempt to shield himself with Rav
Huna's coffin against the pillar of fire. Rather, Rav Chaga did not want to gaze at the pillar of fire.
Gazing at the pillar fire would have been disrespectful because the pillar of fire represented the

4
https://www.dafyomi.co.il/mkatan/insites/mo-dt-025.htm

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glory of Hash-m (see Chagigah 16a). His act of standing up Rav Huna's coffin was not an act of
self-protection, but an act done out of honor for Hash-m and for the deceased.

RAV NISAN ZAKS in his notes to the PERUSH RABEINU GERSHOM ME'OR
HA'GOLAH explains that Rav Chaga's action was not an attempt to protect himself from the fire.
Rather, his intention was to protect the coffin of Rav Huna from the fire by standing it upright.
When Rashi says that "he stood up the coffin before the pillar of fire so that it should not harm
him," he means so that it should not harm Rav Huna.

The Girsa of RABEINU CHANANEL differs slightly from the Girsa in our text. According to
his Girsa, the Gemara cryptically says that "the reason why the members of the household of the
Reish Galusa (d'Vei Reish Galusa) were not punished was because he stood up the coffin of Rav
Huna in an upright position." This is also the Girsa of RABEINU TAM in SEFER
HA'YASHAR (#513) and PERUSH RABEINU SHLOMO BEN HA'YASOM and other
Rishonim. The DIKDUKEI SOFRIM (in Hagahos) writes that he does not know what the
Gemara means according to this Girsa.

Perhaps the Gemara according to this Girsa means as follows. The disgrace shown to Rav Huna in
his burial (by being interred vertically) served as an atonement not only for him but also for his
descendants who comprised the family of the Reish Galusa (as Tosfos points out, Rabeinu
Chananel maintains that "Rav Huna" here refers to Rav Huna the Reish Galusa). Accordingly, the
meaning of the Gemara is clear when it says, "The reason why the members of the household of
the Reish Galusa were not punished was because he stood up the coffin of Rav Huna in an upright
position."

THE DANGER OF THE TIGRIS RIVER

The Gemara relates that when Rava came to the Tigris River, he asked Bar Avin to say some words
of pray so that he should be saved from the water. What danger did the water pose to Rava?

The YA'AVETZ writes that the Girsa of the Gemara should be changed to read "when the Tigris
came" instead of "when he came to the Tigris" ("Ki Havah Asa Diglas" instead of "Ki Hava
Asa l'Diglas"). The Gemara means that when the Tigris overflowed and threatened to drown Rava's
city, Rava asked Bar Avin to pray.

This indeed is the text of the Gemara of RASHI KESAV YAD, and this is the way he explains
the Gemara in his second explanation.

The PERUSH RABEINU GERSHOM ME'OR HA'GOLAH explains that Rava was afraid
when he came to the Tigris because "the waters were frightful." This is also the first explanation
of RASHI KESAV YAD and the ARUCH (Erech Os). (See Berachos 59b, "the waters of the
Tigris are Chadin v'Kalin"; see also RASHI to Bereishis 2:14.) Rava wanted to cross the river, but
he feared that the rough waters would overturn the ferry.

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 Rending One’s Garment
Steinzaltz (OBM) writes:5

The most basic statement of mourning that is required by Jewish law is keriya – tearing one’s
clothing as a sign of loss. The Mishna (24b) teaches that keriya is only done by immediate family
members, but the Gemara on our daf extends the requirement to other people, as well.

Upon hearing that a great Sage has passed on, for example, everyone is supposed to tear their
clothes. Another case is when a person is in the presence of someone who dies. A baraita quotes
R Shimon ben Elazar who teaches that someone who is standing next to a person at the moment
that he dies is obligated to perform keriya, since it is like being in the presence of a
burning sefer Torah.

The comparison between a dying person and a burning sefer Torah is explained by the rishonim in
a variety of ways:

• One version of Rashi suggests that both a sefer Torah and a human soul are referred to as
“the candle of God” and the loss of either one deserves a show of mourning.
• According to another version of Rashi, it is the potential Torah study that is lost with
someone’s death that is comparable to a burning sefer Torah.
• Rashi in Massekhet Shabbat argues that even the simplest Jewish person is full of
the mitzvot that he has fulfilled, and as such can be compared to a sefer Torah.

Two explanations are offered by the Ramban. In one he says that we tear our clothes over
a sefer Torah as well as over someone who fulfills the commandments found in the Torah; in the
other he compares the soul to the letters and words written in the Torah scroll.

Just as the burning sefer Torah loses its writing, the dying man loses his soul. In a similar vein,
there are those who explain that the keriya that we perform is on the loss of holiness that occurs
when the soul exits the body.

Our Gemara tells us that when Rabbi Yaakov died, the stars in the sky were visible in the middle
of the day.6

Rashi explains that the sorrow was so great that the regular world order was shaken. This was
expressed in terms of the stars becoming visible during the day. We can also use an allegorical
approach to understand this Gemara. There are situations in which a leader must be firm and
unyielding. If the head of the community detects that corruptive influences which is contrary to

5
https://steinsaltz.org/daf/moed25/
6
https://www.dafdigest.org/masechtos/MoedKatan%20025.pdf

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Torah values threaten to infiltrate his domain, he must not allow them to have an effect. Rabbi
Yaakov was very firm and constant in his views and philosophy.

There were times when people around him were convinced that their approach was correct, and
that their understanding of a particular situation to proceed was bright and clear. Yet Rabbi Yaakov
was prepared to hold his own and challenge what seemed to be a universally accepted perspective
of tolerance. He would be ready to stand alone in opposition, claiming that what may have seemed
to be clearly acceptable was, in fact, a condition which would lead to darkness and doom. He
would show the community that what they felt was bright and clear was instead only the dim
glimmer of starlight, and that darkness lay ahead.

When Rabbi Yaakov died, the heavens miraculously displayed a signal that this great man
demonstrated this proper trait. There are other types of situations, however, when the leader should
wisely feel the pulse of public opinion, and he should proceed accordingly. When Avraham Avinu
died, all of the great people of the generation stood up and declared (Bava Basra 91b): “Woe to
the world which has lost its leader; woe to the ship that has lost its captain.” There are those who
lead on dry land, and there are those who lead upon the waters.

The dry land represents times of stability and security. A capable administrator with a qualified
team of helpers can guide a nation in times of peace and tranquility. The captain who navigates a
ship upon the stormy waters is faced with a completely different set of problems as he steers his
ship and its passengers to safety. Those around him are in a state of panic, and he must hold the
rudder firmly in order to keep his goal in sight. He must deal with many issues as he responds,
minute by minute to the new challenges which arise. Avraham was seen as the role model to all of
the heads of the world at that time, as he exhibited stellar qualities of leadership during many and
varied times, both those of tranquility as well as those of turmoil.

Yehudah said to Chizkiyah, “Rise from your place because it is not proper etiquette that R’
Huna stands [and you are lying down.”]

Tur (1) cites a Yerushalmi that states that when one stands before a dead body it is not to honor
the deceased that one stands, but rather to give honor to those that bestow kindness to the deceased.

This ruling is also found in Shulchan Aruch (2) where it states that one is required to stand at a
funeral even if the deceased will not be transported. The Taz (3) explains that the reason to stand
is to give honor to those that bestow kindness to the deceased. Taz proceeds to challenge this ruling
from our Gemara. Our Gemara reports that Yehudah told his brother to stand when R’ Huna’s
body was brought into the crypt.

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This clearly indicates that it is necessary to stand and show honor to the deceased rather than to
those who accompany the deceased. To resolve this challenge, Taz explains that the Yerushalmi
refers to a person who is not a Torah scholar, therefore, it is those who accompany the deceased
that are deserving of honor. If, however, the deceased was a Torah scholar, as in the incident
involving R’ Huna, one must stand to show honor to the deceased as well.

Another point raised by Taz from the Yerushalmi is that it can be inferred that it is appropriate to
stand before any person who is performing a mitzvah. This concept is supported by the Gemara in
Kiddushin (4) that highlights the significance of standing for those people who are transporting
their bikkurim to Yerushalayim.

Another example of this is mentioned in Teshuvas Yad Eliyahu (5) where he writes that one must
stand before people who collect tzedaka without receiving remuneration. The Minchas Yitzchok
(6) qualifies this ruling of Yad Eliyahu. If a tzedaka collector is assigned to collect a fixed sum
from each member of the community it is logical to distinguish between one who performs the
task for free and one who is paid to do that job.

If, however, the tzedaka collector also has the task of convincing others to pledge money to
tzedaka, like most of the tzedaka collectors nowadays, it is necessary to stand before them even if
they are paid for their service.

The reason is that they are considered to be performing a mitzvah, i.e. convincing others to donate
to tzedaka, and remuneration does not detract from their status as one performing a mitzvah, who
is deserving of honor.

On our daf we find that Ravina’a eulogizer said that his mourners should spend day and night
lamenting, just as Ravina immersed himself day and night in Torah study.

Like Ravina, the Steipler Gaon, zt”l, immersed himself in Torah study day and night. While the
Steipler served as the Rosh Yeshiva of the Novaradohker Yeshiva in Pinsk, his regular schedule
was to learn the whole night and then continue on to Shacharis in the morning.

When the Steipler’s daughter was born, she would cry unless she was rocked. Since the Steipler
was a good father, as much as he was a Gaon in Torah, he would assume the burden of soothing
her much of the time. Since he preferred to study uninterrupted in the outer room with all the
seforim while rocking her, he found that the solution was to attach a string from her cradle to his
own leg. That way he could comfort her without having to disturb his own studies.

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Although the Chazon Ish, zt”l, generally hesitated to send people on errands for him for fear of
undercutting their time for Torah study, he had no reservations about sending the Steipler. When
asked why, he responded, “He never wastes a second even while his body is busy doing something
else. Sending him will certainly not cause him to waste a moment!”

One of the Steipler’s sons-in-law passed away at a relatively young age and the Gaon was left to
help his daughter raise the grandchildren. He would often take one of his young grandchildren out
for long walks in a carriage, but this didn’t distract him from his learning in the slightest.

While the Steipler pushed the carriage, he could always be heard reciting Mishnayos from
memory!

A funeral gone awry.

RABBI ELLIOT GOLDBERG WRITES:7

Among the rabbinic personalities we’ve encountered many times already in our study of Daf Yomi
is Rav Huna, a leading scholar who lived during the third century. Tradition tells us that he was
the head of the academy in Sura, Babylonia, and there raised up a gaggle of scholars. As the leader
of his generation, his funeral was sure to have been a memorable one. On today’s daf we learn that
it was — but not for the reasons that one might have thought.

Because of his great status, Rav Huna’s students sought to honor him by placing a Torah on his
funeral bier. But Rav Tahlifa stopped them by citing an example from Rav Huna himself:

I saw Rav Huna, who wished to sit on his bed, and there was a Torah scroll placed on it. And
he turned a jug over and placed the Torah scroll on it. Apparently he holds that it is prohibited
to sit on a bed upon which a Torah scroll lies.

Because Rav Huna held that one should not sit on a bed with a Torah scroll, Rav Tahlifa posits
that it would be inappropriate to honor him in that way after he died. But this was not the only
miscue by Rav Huna’s mourners. When removing his body from the house, they discovered that
the bier wouldn’t fit through the door. So they tried to lift it out through an opening in the roof.
That is, until Rav Hisda related another teaching from Rav Huna:

This I learned from him: A scholar’s honor is for him to be taken out through the main opening.

In response, Rav Huna’s body was transferred to a smaller bier that would fit through the door.
But Rav Hisda intervenes again with yet another teaching from Rav Huna.

I learned from him as follows: A scholar’s honor is for him to be taken out on the first bier.

7
Mytalmudiclearning.com

14
Not having so many options left, the doorway was broken down so the first bier could be carried
out.

One would hope things would have gone smoothly from here on out. If only!

At the funeral, a eulogy was delivered by Rabbi Abba, who began by saying:

Our rabbi was so worthy that the divine presence should rest upon him, except for the fact that
Babylonia caused it not to.

In other words, Rav Huna would have merited having God’s presence reside with him during his
lifetime, but for the fact that he lived in Babylonia. We’ve seen these sorts of piquant
slights exchanged by the rabbis of Babylonia and Israel before in Daf Yomi, but still this is a
curious way to open a eulogy and a voice from the crowd objects. This time, instead of Rav Hisda,
it is one of his sons:

Is it not stated: “The word of the Lord came [hayo haya] to Ezekiel the priest, son of Buzi, in
the land of the Chaldeans” (Ezekiel 1:3)?

The questioner asserts that it’s possible for God’s presence to rest upon a great figure outside the
land of Israel and that Rabbi Abba was wrong to suggest otherwise. But the Gemara rejects this,
noting that the doubling of the verb in the verse, hayo haha, suggests that God’s presence came to
Ezekiel first in Israel and stayed with him as he travelled to the land of the Chaldeans.

Rabbi Abba’s opening, in other words, has merit. But Rav Hisda is nonetheless embarrassed by
his son’s interruption and slaps him with his sandal: “Have I not told you not to trouble everyone
(with questions in the middle of a eulogy)?”

Based upon Rav Huna’s words, this may not have been an isolated incident. It seems Rav Huna’s
son may have been a blurter or struggled with impulse control. Either way, the scolding created an
additional interruption to the funeral service, adding to the chaos of the day.

Why would all these incidents have been entered into the talmudic record and preserved for
posterity? From the Talmud’s perspective, everyday occurrences in the lives of the rabbis — or,
in this case, at their funerals — are also Torah, and we record them so that future generations can
learn from them.

In this case, we learn that treating a scholar respectfully after they die includes adhering to their
teachings about ritual performances. And from the behavior of Rav Hisda’s son at the funeral, we
learn that while it may be OK to challenge a colleague in the beit midrash, we shouldn’t give voice
to our objections during a funeral. These incidents too are Torah — and we should learn from
them.

15
Rabbi Johnny Solomon writes:8

Early on in our daf (Moed Katan 25a) a ‘suggestion’ is made that children die young because their
parents did not mourn the death of an upright person - which parallels a number of similar
‘suggestions’ mentioned elsewhere (Shabbat 32b) which also attribute the death of children to
various transgressions of their parents.

You will note that I have deliberately used the word ‘suggestion’, and this is because when
tragedies – especially those as painful as the loss of a child – occur, there are those who attempt to
comfort those in mourning by providing them with a rationale for what has happened.

The problem with this is that, whatever the intention of the individual doing so, not only does a
person making such a claim express hubris - as if they are, to use a phrase employed by Rav Aharon
Lichtenstein, ‘claiming to have God’s phone number’, but it can also cause incredible anguish to
a parent who not only is overcome with pain, but who now is forced to cope with the suggestion
that what has happened is somehow their fault.

Significantly, this point was brought home to me three times in the past two weeks. Firstly, while
recently learning the sefer ‘V’Aleihu Lo Yibol’9 I read a poignant exchange on this issue where,
soon after the tragic death of his baby, a father approached Rabbi Auerbach and, having cited the
above-mentioned teachings that young children die due to the sins of their parents, he asked what
he needed to do in terms of repentance.

Let us pause to reflect on this: This parent just lost a baby. But because of a teaching, which is
likely to have been shared with him during his hour of greatest grief, he now felt guilty and sought
spiritual guidance about how he should ‘fix’ whatever sin that he may have done that has caused
this tragedy.

In response, Rabbi Auerbach replied to the father: ‘we do not understand the decision-making of
God, and why, or for what purpose, different events take place. Certainly, we cannot associate
any tragedy with any particular action and thereby claim that because of this action, this
particular tragedy occurred. Of course, we need to strive to be committed to all aspects of Torah,
the service of God and the performance of good deeds. But it is impossible to point to anything
and say that this was the cause of the death of the baby.’

The second reason why my headspace was directed to this topic was because I recently had a
spiritual coaching session with a mother whose child is very unwell and who, having heard of
teachings such as those found in our daf, was feeling that what was happening to her and her child
was a form of divine punishment.

Let us pause to reflect on this: This parent is – as we speak - wrestling with the challenge of a
child who is unwell. Yet, based on what she had previously learnt, or had recently been told by

8
www.rabbijohnnysolomon.com
9
A 3-volume collection of rulings and insights of Rabbi Shlomo Zalman Auerbach - Vol. 3 p. 164

16
others, in her hour of greatest worry she was feeling the burden of guilt - implying that what is
happening to her is, in some way, her fault.

In our session I shared a range of perspectives with this mother such as teachings from Rabbi Sacks
who explains that, ‘Poverty, disease, famine, injustice, and the exploitation of the powerless by
the powerful are not the will of God. They may be part of human nature, but we have the power to
rise above nature. God wants us not to accept but to heal, to cure, to prevent’ (Judaism’s Life-
Changing Ideas pp. 48-49), and in doing so helped her move away from a perspective of guilt to
find some clarity during this incredibly difficult period.

Thirdly, in recent days I corresponded with a parent whose two sons had died some years ago and
who, during the most painful chapter of their life, was confidently and insistently told by rabbis
and peers that whatever was happening was a message from God. Yet, whatever the intention of
those individuals who said what they did, they were received by the grieving parent as words of
pain and cruelty rather than words of comfort and clarity, and in response to this, and the fact that
these words came from representatives of religion, this particular parent felt the need to distance
themselves from religion.

Personally, I don’t have God’s phone number, I don’t know anyone who does, and I believe that
when tragedies take place, our task is not to have the hubris to claim to know why these events
have happened. Instead, our primary role is to be there to provide comfort and support to those in
distress, while also having the wisdom to know what to say, as well as what not to say, when others
are suffering.

17
Rav Binyamin Zimmerman writes:10

Hiddur of a Zaken

We have been discussing the following central mitzva from Parashat

Kedoshim (Vayikra 19:32)

The elder (zaken) in question, as the Talmud explains, is not necessarily a senior citizen,
but rather a Torah scholar. Even an unlearned senior is entitled to respect, but honoring the aged
is different than honoring scholars. The former have lived lives and experienced enough to have a
great insight into and appreciation of God's actions in the world; therefore, they deserve respect.
However, their experience of Godliness is essentially passive; scholars, on the other hand, have
actively acquired wisdom through the study of Torah, and therefore, they deserve a greater degree
of veneration.

Indeed, honoring scholars leads one not only to appreciate wisdom; it inspires one to attain
wisdom in a way that will develop into a greater connection with God. For this reason, as we saw
last week, the Midrash states honoring a scholar can be a religious experience, as the verse
concludes, “And you shall fear your God; I am God,” indicating that appreciating Torah
scholarship will lead to greater reverence for and devotion to God.

The Alshikh explains that through honoring scholars, one may benefit from their good
advice and moral teaching, improving one’s character and devotion, as the conclusion of this verse,
"And you shall fear your God,” indicates. However, there is another verse which we must examine.

The Need for a Second Mitzva

The Torah commands:

10
https://etzion.org.il/en/philosophy/issues-jewish-thought/issues-mussar-and-faith/honoring-ones-rebbe

18
 The verse begins with the preposition et, which usually precedes direct objects but
sometimes means “with.” One Tanna, Shimon the Imsonite, expounded very appearance of et,
according to the Talmud (Bava Kamma 41b) explaining how the word always indicates that the
verb should be applied not only to the direct object, but to something associated with it as well:

Shimon the Imsonite demurs when his methodology suggest that there is another to be
revered like God, but Rabbi Akiva rescues this approach by declaring that Torah scholars are
actually deserving of the same treatment, worthy of mora — fear, reverence, awe. This indicates
that a Torah scholar to some degree is viewed as a representative of God on this earth and should
be treated accordingly.

However, this exegesis creates a problem; if this verse already mandates venerating
scholars, what does the mitzva of hiddur for a zaken add? In fact, the language in the two verses
bears a significant resemblance: fearing God is the conclusion of Vayikra 19:32 and the opening
of Devarim 6:16. Indeed, this similarity might be what leads Rabbi Akiva to interpolate
the zaken into the latter verse.

But why would we need two mitzvot that overlap? What is added by the mitzva
of hiddur that is not required by the mitzva of mora?

Distinguishing Between a Scholar and a Rebbe

Let us consider the Rambam’s view, especially as explicated by the Brisker Rav. These
two mitzvot may actually speak about two different individuals, as one focuses on every Torah
scholar, even one whom the individual has no personal relationship with, and the other speaks
about one's personal teacher, one’s rebbe.

The distinction between these two individuals is already mentioned in the

Talmud (Kiddushin 33a):

The Talmud goes on to say that Abbayei would stand as soon as he saw the ear of the
donkey of his rebbe, Rav Yosef, as the tall ears were the first portion of the animal's body that
Abbayei could see.

19
 Why is there a difference between a scholar and one's rebbe?

The Ran explains that there is no real difference in obligation between the two; however,
when standing for one's rebbe, it is apparent to all that even at a distance the student is standing
for the teacher’s honor, yet nobody will realize that one is standing on behalf of another scholar's
presence unless this other scholar is right next to him, at least within four cubits.

However, one might explain differently based on another Talmudic passage

there (Kiddushin 31a-b):

The Talmud presents a dispute as to whether a Torah scholar can waive the honor (kavod)
due to him. Although Rav Yosef adduces proof from the story of the Exodus, in which God waives
His honor by leading the Jewish people through the desert, Rava counters that nothing can be
proven from God's behavior: even though the honor due to God for his actions is greater than that
due to the scholar, God is Creator of everything. All is His, and therefore He can waive His honor,
because the honor is actually due to Him. The Torah scholar, however, Rava reasons, is accorded
honor because of the Torah he has studied and houses in his mind, and that Torah does not belong
to him. Therefore, although the scholar is less deserving of honor than God, it is not his honor to
waive. Nevertheless, Rava reverses his position:

Rava reconsiders his position, and actually affirms Rav Yosef's ruling that a Torah scholar
can forgo his honor, based on a verse at the beginning of Tehillim, describing the paradigmatic
righteous individual:

But his desire is in the Torah of God, and in his Torah he meditates day and night.

20
 Rashi explains that before one studies Torah, as much as one desires to study it, it is the
Torah of God. After one toils and attains the knowledge, the Torah actually becomes his. It is not
only his Torah scholarship but his Torah as well, and therefore, he has the right to forgo his own
honor.
According to this understanding, the Torah is the scholars, and therefore, it is his right to
forgo that kavod. The Talmud continues by questioning if this is really true. It records an incident
in which Rava poured wine for students of his at his son's wedding. This would seem to be an act
of waiving one's honor, yet Rava got upset at two of his students who did not rise in front of him
as he poured their glasses. The Talmud asks, if a Torah scholar may waive his honor, and Rava
was doing so by pouring, then why should his students have had to stand up for him?

The Talmud answers with a few short words:

Nevertheless, they should have shown him veneration.

The Talmud states that even when a scholar forgoes his kavod, one must still show
him hiddur. But why would this be? Isn't the whole obligation in the first place to give hiddur to
a zaken?

Furthermore, the Talmud there also details a number of cases in which certain Torah
scholars who were known to be very easygoing and humble got upset at their students for not
standing for them. Why were they so indignant that a minimal amount of honor be shown to them?

The Understanding of the Rambam

The Rambam describes the honor due to a Torah scholar in two separate chapters of Hilkhot
Talmud Torah. In chapter 5 he focuses on the honor because one's rebbe, and in chapter 6 he
discusses the honor due to every scholar. A comparison reveals some fine distinctions. In 5:1, he
states:

The Rambam continues to list the various forms of honor one must accord one's rebbe,
including standing for him from the moment he sees him. In 5:11, he mentions the right of

21
one's rebbe to waive his honor, with the additional comment that even in such a case, the student
must still treat the rebbe with hiddur:

The Rambam here does not quote the general obligation of hiddur; rather, he states that the honor
because one’s rebbe surpasses the honor because one’s parent, bordering on the reverence due to
God Himself.

In the following chapter regarding the honor due to a Torah scholar, the description is very
different. The Rambam begins:

He then explains:

In this chapter there is no description of a Torah scholar being like one parents or God;
there is merely an obligation to stand for him when he comes within four cubits.

Furthermore, in all of chapter 6, the Rambam never mentions that a Torah scholar has the
right to forgo the honor due to him. What could explain the Rambam's sharp distinction between
the two types of scholars?

The Brisker Rav points out a fascinating explanation. Though it does not accord with the
standard halakhic ruling, it does put a new spin on the holiness involved in this mitzva.

He explains that according to the Rambam, there are essentially two separate obligations.
The honor one must accord one's rebbe is not based on the verse in Vayikra, but rather the verse
in Devarim, which Rabbi Akiva explains as likening the reverence due to a scholar to that due to
God.

Because there are different sources for the halakhot, the ramifications are also different.
One must stand for a Torah scholar only when he comes within four cubits for, as the Talmud says,
that is the honor due to him because of hiddur. However, the source of honor for a rebbe is from

22
the other verse, which calls not for hiddur but for mora; therefore, it requires standing from the
moment the rebbe comes in sight.

The Brisker Rav adds that although Rava concludes that a Torah scholar's Torah is his own
and therefore he can waive his honor, this only applies to the unique and special honor because
one's own rebbe. However, as the story in the Talmud shows, Rava got upset with his students
when they failed to show him hiddur even though he had waived the honor due to him, because he
wanted to teach his students that there is a distinction between the honor due to a scholar and that
because one's rebbe, and even if a rebbe waives the unique honor due to him as a rebbe, he may
not forgo the honor due to him as a Torah scholar.

The implications of this fascinating explication are far-reaching. Although it reads

beautifully in terms of the Talmudic text and the Rambam’s ruling, the Talmud notes a Torah
scholar may forgo his honor because the Torah wisdom he has attained is his own. If so, why
would there be a distinction, in terms of waiving kavod, between the average Torah scholar and
one's rebbe?

Housing Torah and Personifying Torah

To understand this distinction, we must examine how Torah study transforms an individual
and the way in which a rebbe causes his student to be born anew.

While the scholar has attained Torah knowledge as his own, the hiddur shown to him is
due to the Torah within him, not his own personal Torah. Thus, one can understand why the
Rambam (Hilkhot Sefer Torah 10:10) refers to hiddur in discussing the spot one designates for a
Torah scroll:

Hiddur is the veneration one shows to an ark, a physical structure that houses a Torah, or
to a Torah scholar, who houses the Torah which he has studied. Therefore, under no circumstances
can this hiddur be waived, as one venerates the Torah and not the person himself.

However, Torah knowledge is not only wisdom contained in one's mind; it is also a
transformative experience. As one honors his rebbe, he glorifies the personal Torah, the Torah
which can transform an individual. For this reason the rebbe is likened to a parent, as he births a
new individual, one who has come to know the transformative effects of Torah study. Furthermore,
as Rabbi Akiva teaches, a rebbe is likened to God, as he provides a direct connection between his
student and the Divine.

Rav Soloveitchik adds that this understanding is rooted in the halakhic principle that a
craftsman acquires the additional value of an object he works on. Just as a craftsman, such as a
potter, acquires the additional value of the pot which he has created and transformed,

23
the rebbe who shapes his student spiritually acquires a part of his personality; therefore, it is as if
he actually has formed him and has born him.

In truth, every Jew has the potential to be a Torah scholar. The Talmud (Nidda 30b) teaches
that every Jew is taught Torah in his mother's womb, a potential wisdom waiting to be actualized
(see Year 1, Lesson 3):

For this reason, all Jews are likened to a Torah scroll, as our daf the
Talmud (Moed Katan 25a) notes:

The death of a Jew is likened to the destruction of a Torah scroll.

When one honors the Torah scholar, one essentially shows honor to the actualized Torah
that every individual contains. The zaken who has acquired wisdom has done what all Jews can
do. Yet when one honors his rebbe, he especially accords honor to the actualization that
his rebbe accomplished for and within him; he becomes a walking sefer Torah. The ability of one
to be a walking Torah through studying God’s word is expressed vividly by Rabbi Joseph B.
Soloveitchik in “Torah and Humility” 11

11
available at: http://www.vbm-torah.org/archive/humility.htm

24
 When one meets a scholar, one must respect the Torah wisdom he has attained. One must
realize that his act may lead to a greater reverence for God, as the conclusion of the verse states,
“And you shall fear your God; I am God.”

However, when one honors one's own rebbe, one recognizes the transformative aspects of
Torah, the Torah which has become his rebbe's own, and therefore that kavod may be waived by
the rebbe.

This, in turn, explains the distinction between the Holy Ark which requires hiddur and
the rebbe who requires mora akin to a parent and God. The Holy Ark houses the Torah; it contains
the words that were engraved on the Two Tablets. However, one's rebbe does not only hold Torah
within him; he personifies it as a walking sefer Torah, as the words of Torah are engraved in his
heart and personality. (See Mishlei 7:3.)

With this in mind, we can see that there is no better place to teach this mitzva than Parashat
Kedoshim. This portion, which provides a pathway to holiness, not only lists one’s interpersonal
duties but recognizes that one who has studied Torah houses the Torah of God. Such a person is a
walking Holy Ark. The Ramban (Shemot 25:2) explains that the Ark of the Covenant stood in the
center of the sanctuary because it sanctified the entire premises. When one honors a Torah scholar,
one recognizes that Torah is the sanctifying element of life. By following this path, one may realize
the conclusion of the verse: “And you shall fear your God; I am God.”

25
 Why is Keriah Performed on the Left Side for Parents but on the
Right Side for Other Relatives?
Rabbi Prof. David Golinkin writes:12

Yoreh Deah 340:9 in the Shakh and the Taz

Question from a rabbi who recently lost his father:

For all these years I have conducted funerals and cut keriah according to Yoreh Deah, children
on the left and spouses on the right. My mother blanched at this and we still did it for her on the
right, but it has made me wonder: How far back can we trace this distinction? It feels like a
statement that blood is thicker than contracts. Is this true? Or does the child need to have his/her
heart exposed, in order to get in touch with their own feelings? Can you help me with this?

Responsum:

I) The Talmudic Period

12
https://schechter.edu/why-is-keriah-performed-on-the-left-side-for-parents-but-on-the-right-side-for-other-relatives-responsa-
in-a-moment-volume-6-issue-no-7-june-2012/

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The tractate of Moed Kattan which deals with the laws of mourning makes a number of
distinctions between keriah for a parent as opposed to other relatives. The following are some of
these laws as summarized in Shulhan Arukh Yoreh Deah 340: 9, 12-14:
For all deceased he tears a handbreadth of the outermost garment and it is enough; for his father
and mother he tears all of his garments even if he is wearing ten garments until he uncovers his
heart…

For all deceased he may leave the border [of the garment] intact and tear below it; for his father
and mother he must tear the entire border.

For all the deceased he should tear on the inside so that others do not see; but for his father and
mother he must tear on the outside in front of everyone.

For all the deceased, if he wants he tears by hand or with a utensil; for his father and mother by
hand.

For all the deceased, if he changes his clothes within seven days he changes them and does not
tear; for his father and mother if he changes them within seven days he tears all of the clothes and
does not repair them ever, just like the original clothes he was wearing…

It is clear from these and other laws that mourning for a parent was considered by the Talmudic
Sages much more traumatic than mourning for other relatives.

However, it is also clear from the Talmud that no distinction was made between a parent and
another relative regarding which side of the garment should be torn. Rabbi Shabetai Rapoport
(1621-1660; the Shakh to Yoreh Deah 340, subparagraph 19) refers to the following source: “Our
Sages taught: they told him his father died and he tore, [and later they told him] his son died and
he added…”. In other words, if a parent dies, you tear your garment and if another relative
subsequently dies, you then add to that tearin the very same place (Moed Kattan 26b and Yoreh
Deah340:22). The Talmud does not mention which side, but both tears are made on the same side
in the same place.

II) The Early Ashkenazic Custom

The “grandfather” of all Ashkenazic customs was R. Ya’akov Mollin, the Maharil of Mainz (1360-
1427). Hundreds if not thousands of his customs were codified by R. Moshe Isserles (1525-1572)
in his Ashkenazic glosses to the Shulhan Arukh. Many of his customs were recorded by his devoted
disciple Rabbi Zalman in Minhagei Maharil. There we find touching details about the death of the
Maharil’s wife in the year 1426 (ed. Spitzer,Jerusalem, 1989, p. 607). Among other details, we are
told that the Rabbi took a knife and made a cut on top of all of his son’s garments except
the kutonet [undershirt?], and he told [his son] that he himself should tear every garment until
opposite his heart, and he made the keriah on the right side of the collar.

In other words, the Maharil, who is the source of a large percentage of Ashkenazic customs, helped
his son cut keriahfor his mother on the right side of his garment.

27
 III) R. Shlomo Luria – the Source for Today’s Custom

R. Shlomo Luria (the Maharshal,Poland, 1510-1573) was a brilliant rabbi and halakhic authority
who was very well-known in his time, but much less so today.

In his little-known commentary to the Tur, which has only been printed once (in the back of Tur
El Hamekorot, Jeusalem, 1959 to Yoreh Deah 340, s.v. v’koreah) he wrote: “And
regarding keriah, we have the custom that for a father or mother, [one tears] on the left side,
and for other relatives such as his children and siblings on the right, and so I have found”. It
should be noted that the Maharshal gives no explanation for this custom.

The Maharshal was subsequently quoted by R. Yoel Sirkes, theBah (1561-1640) in his
commentary to Tur Yoreh Deah 340 (s.v. al kol hametim, fol. 289b in the standard editions) who
adds a reason:

Nevertheless, it stands to reason that since for his father and mother he needs to tear [all his
garments] until he uncovers his heart [see Yoreh Deah 340:9 quoted above], and the heart is on the
left, therefore, he must tear on the left to uncover his heart, and so is the custom in the communities
according to the Maharshal.

In other words, this custom began in Poland in the 16th century and R. Yoel Sirkes justified it in
the basis of logic in the 17th century.13

IV) The Custom Was Not Entirely Accepted

Nevertheless, this custom was not welcomed in the 17th century. Rabbi David Halevi, the Taz,
(1586-1667) records the opinions of the Maharil, the Maharshal, and his father-in-law the Bah, but
does not take a clear stand (Taz to Yoreh Deah 340, sub-paragraph 6).

Rabbi Shabetai Rappaport, the Shakh, mentioned above, quotes the Maharshal and the Bah, but
adds: “this is from the point of view of custom, but according to the law, it appears [mashma] that
on the side one tears for his father and mother one also tears for other relatives” and he then refers
to the sources quoted above at the end of paragraph I.

V) After the Fact, Either Side is Acceptable

Many later halakhic authorities stress that if a person performskeriah on the right side for a parent,
he has fulfilled his obligation after the fact and does not need to tear his garment on the left and
vice versa.
13
It was subsequently quoted in recent works about the laws of mourning (R. Maurice Lamm, The Jewish Way in Death and
Mourning, New York, 1969, p. 43, revised edition, New York, 2000, p. 45; R. Tzvi Rabinowicz, A Guide to Life, London, 1964;
third edition, Northvale, New Jersey and London, 1989, p. 26; R. Isaac Klein, A Time to be Born A Time to Die, New York, 1976,
p. 29 [and the Hebrew version Eit Laledet V’eit Lamut, edited by David Golinkin, Jerusalem, 1991, p. 33] and a Guide to Jewish
Religious Practice, New York, 1979, p. 279; R. Carl Astor in R. Martin Cohen and R. Michael Katz, eds., The Observant Life,
New York, 2012, p. 285).

28
This is the opinion of R. Hayyim Yosef David Azulay, the Hida (1724-1806, Shiyurey
Brakhah to Yoreh Deah 340, subparagraph 11) and R. Avraham Danzig (1748-1820, Hokhmat
Adam 152:6). R. Hayyim Hizkiya Medini, (1832-1904, Sedei Hemed, ed. Shneyerson, Vol. 4, p.
710, paragraph 173), quoting five rabbis, adds that it is also alright after the fact if a person tore
on the left for another relative. R. Yehiel Michal Epstein (1829-1908, Arukh Hashulhan, Yoreh
Deah 340:8) stresses that this is a custom and not a law “and if he switched either way he has
fulfilled his obligation”.

Recent rabbis in this camp include R. Yehiel Michal Tukechinsky, Gesher Hahayyim, Jerusalem,
1960, p. 59; R. Aharon Levin, Zikhron Meir, Toronto, 1985, p. 201; R. Hayyim Binyamin
Goldberg, Penei Baruch, Jerusalem, 1986, p. 13; R. Abner Weiss, Death and Bereavement: A
Halakhic Guide, Hoboken and New York, 1991, p. 70; R. Yitzhak Yosef, Yalkut Yosef: Hilkhot
Bikur Holim V’aveilut, Jerusalem, 2004, p. 213; and R. Gavriel Goldman,Mei’olam V’ad Olam,
Jerusalem, 2006, p. 103 (I have found only one rabbi who debates whether one shouldredo keriah
if he tore on the wrong side – see Shevet Shimon onYoreh Deah 340 quoted in Kol Bo Al Aveilut,
p. 31, paragraph 17).

VI) A Parent Should Tear on the Left Side for a Child

This was the opinion of two rabbis – Hadrat Kodesh, part 2, 41 (quoted by R. Yekutiel
Greenwald, Kol Bo Al Aveilut, Jerusalem and New York, 1973, p. 31, note 20) and Kuntress
Aharon to Lehem Hapanim on Yoreh Deah 340 by R. Moshe Katz, Hena, 1716 in the name
of Ma’ane Lashon (quoted by Rabbi Shalom Shachna Tehernick, Hayim Uveracha L’mishmeret
Shalom, New York, 1949, p. 46, paragraph 67, s.v. keriah).

I have not yet seen these two books but it seems clear that they were willing to modify the
Maharshal’s custom.

VII) Summary and Conclusions

The Talmud and subsequent codes of Jewish law devote quite a lot of space to the laws of keriah.
None of the early sources until the 16th century make a distinction between keriah on the left for
parents and on the right for other relatives. Indeed, the Maharil helped his son tear on the right for
his mother.

The Maharshal in the 16th century is the first to mention a custom which differentiates between
parents and other relatives and the Bah explained this custom in the 17th century on the basis of
logic – since a child tears all garments and “bears the heart”, he should tear on the left side.

This custom was questioned by the Shakh in the 17th century. It was later accepted, but most
authorities stressed that it is a custom and not binding after the fact. Others changed the custom
and said that a parent tears for a child on the left side.

Therefore, those who want to follow the Maharshal’s custom may certainly do so, but from the
point of view of Jewish law, one can cut keriah on either side for all relatives.

29
 "The Death of Moses" by Alexandre Cabanel

The Divine Kiss

Despite God's refusal to allow Moses to enter the land of Israel, God gives Moses
a gentle death and a loving burial.14

Commentary on Parashat Vezot Haberakhah, Deuteronomy 33:1 - 34:12

Vezot Haberakhah, the concluding portion of the Torah , is centered around the death of Moshe
Rabbenu, Moses our Teacher. Generations of Bible readers have wondered about the stated reason
why Moses was prohibited from entering the Promised Land.

The sin for which he is so punished, which occurred in Numbers 20:10-11 (for striking rather
than speaking to a rock in order to bring forth water for the people), seems insignificant in
comparison to his accomplishments and his obedience to God. Moses could have been taught the
point that all people die just as well if he had been allowed to lead the people over the river and
then had been allowed to die in the land of Canaan.

The Midrash discusses both this issue and Moses’ humanity in its commentary on Moses’
resistance to God’s decree. According to the Midrash , Moses begs God for favor and forgiveness
for his sins. He tells God that he has been held to a higher standard and prays 515 times for a
reversal of the decree. Moses pleads with God to make him into an animal and let him at least

14
https://www.myjewishlearning.com/article/the-divine-kiss/

30
touch the land, but God refuses. God then relents a little and allows Moses to view the Promised
Land. Other midrashim also contain the same general theme.

In contrast to the image of Moses begging to be turned into an animal, the Midrash grants Moses
a beautiful death. At the end, God leans down from the heavens and ends Moses’ life with a soft,
gentle kiss. This is derived from Deuteronomy 34:5 , where it is written, “So Moses, the servant
of the Eternal, died there, in the land of Moab, at the command of the Eternal.” The Hebrew
reads, al pi Adonai, “by the mouth of the Eternal.” Hence the legend about God kissing Moses at
his moment of death.

According to the Midrash, God wept after Moses died, as did the heavens and the
earth. Deuteronomy 34:6 tells us that “God buried him in the valley in the land of Moab, near
Beth-peor; and no one knows his burial place to this day.”

Moses deserved the honor of having God perform his burial because, the Midrash says, during the
Exodus from Egypt, when everyone else was looking for gold and silver, Moses was looking for
the coffin of Joseph. And when Moses found it, he carried it on his own shoulders. Thus Moses
helped to fulfill the oath made to Joseph in Genesis 50:25 : “So Joseph made the sons of Israel
swear, saying, ‘When God has taken notice of you, you shall carry my bones from here.'” The
honor and respect that Moses paid to Joseph’s last wish to be buried with his ancestors are
rewarded when God buries Moses, a singular divine act.

Thus we find that even though the decree of death cannot be overruled, God displays great
compassion and empathy for the greatest prophet that ever arose in Israel, “whom the Eternal
singled out, face to face.” ( Deut. 34:10 ) Would that each of us be granted the same gentle and
loving death.

As we end this year’s annual Torah reading cycle and complete our reading of Devarim
(Deuteronomy), the fifth and final book of the Torah, we say Chazak, chazak ve’nitchazek! “Be
strong, be strong, and let us be strengthened!”

31
 With A Kiss

Rabbi Label Lam writes:15

So Moses the servant of the LORD died there, in the land of Moab, at the command of the LORD.

Deut 34:5

RASHI

They journeyed from Kadesh and encamped in Mount Hor, at the edge of the land of Edom. Then
Aaron the Kohen went up to Mount Hor at the word of (literally “by the mouth of”) HASHEM
and died there, in the fortieth year after the Children of Israel went forth from the Land of Egypt,
in the fifth month on the first day of the month. Aaron was one hundred and twenty-three years
old at his death on Mount Hor. (Bamidbar 33:37-39)

At the word of (by the mouth of) HASHEM: We learn that he died with a kiss. (Rashi)

Here we learn that Aaron died by the “kiss of death”! Why should it matter to us how he died?
What is this “kiss of death”?

The Talmud tells us: “903 forms of death were created in the world, as it says, (Tehillim 68:21)
“The Lord has many avenues toward death”. The Numerical value of the word “totza’os”-“many
avenues” is equal to 903. The harshest of them all is “Askara”, the mildest of them is Neshika-
“the kiss of death”. Askara is similar to thorns that are entangled in a ball of wool sheerings and
they are yanked back (in order to remove them). There are those that say that “Askara” is similar
to ropes that are squeezed through tiny holes. “Neshika”- the “Kiss” is comparable to removing a
hair from milk. (Brochos 8A)

15
https://torah.org/torah-portion/dvartorah-5770-matos/

32
What is the Talmud explaining to us with these odd metaphors? It seems that the degree of
difficulty of death is dependent upon the extent of entanglement and acuteness of “identity crisis”
between body and soul. As the old song says, “Breaking up is hard to do!” I ask, “Is it always?”

I have etched in my memory a scene I witnessed many years ago while traversing the bustling
streets of New York City. A delivery van had stopped briefly by the curb to drop a package and
when he emerged from the building he saw that his vehicle was already being lifted to be towed
by the Department of Transportation. The officer heartlessly presiding over operation remained
deaf to pleadings of the owner. The desperate fellow even threw himself onto the front windshield
of his van refusing to let go until he was forcibly peeled off.

The tantrum he exhibited could only be compared to the separation anxiety that little children
experience the moment they detect that mommy intends to drop them off or leave them with a
babysitter. It was quite a drama and my mind was reflecting all the while on the description in the
Talmud of “Askara”.

What about “Neshika”? I heard from my Rosh HaYeshiva, Rabbi Yisrael Rokowsky 29 years ago
a question and an answer he had on the metaphor employed when describing “Neshika” – that
supernal kiss. Now, the Talmud had said that it is as easy as removing a hair from milk. He asked,
“Since when is the soul compared to hair and the body compared to milk? It should be just the
opposite!” We find that Essau was a physical specimen and earthy in all his ways. Therefore, he
was born hairy. He even settled at Har Seir- literally a Mountain of Hair”. In the language of
symbolism hair represents materialism. Milk is white and pure and nourishing. The soul should
rather be identified with milk. Why then is that lightest of all forms of death like removing a hair
from milk? It should be the other way around.

The answer is that hair is the body and milk is the soul and the experience of “Neshika” merited
by Aaron, Moshe, and Miriam is like the removing of a slight interposition. The body of the great
one is almost nothing, compared to the soul. It’s like a single hair. In one painless move like taking
off a shoe they are enveloped in a Soul World, close again to the One who came to pick them up
with the lure of a kiss.

This is more like the experience of that infant when the mother returns to retrieve the child from
the school, camp, or babysitter. He or she is drawn instinctively and runs out willingly to rejoin
his loving parent.

Perhaps it is no mistake that we find no other exact date explicitly stated in Torah to mark the day
of departure from this world except Aaron the Kohen, who died on the 1st of Av-(Literally-
“Father”) which falls out at the beginning of this week. He left a place called Kadesh- which means
holy and by the boundary of but not quite entangled with Edom, where the descendants of Essau
settled, there a loving Father greeted him with a kiss.

33
 What is the kiss of death?16

Chazal tell us (need help with the source) that at least 3 people died "b'neshika" with a 'kiss' from
God, Moshe, Aron and Miriam. (Rashi on Bamidbar 20:1, 33:38; Devarim 34:5)

The Talmud (Berachot 8A) says that there are 903 types of death in the world, and the least painful
one is a kiss. From the way Rashi explains it, it appears that the pain refers to the separating of the
soul from the body.

The Talmud explains that the Kiss of Death is likened to removing a hair from milk. This does not
require any forceful separation at all.

The Talmud (Baba Batra 17A) (and Rashi) explain that "The Kiss of Death" means that G-d
Himself took their soul, not the Angel of Death. The Talmud their says that 6 were not killed by
the Angel of Death, but rather G-d Himself took their souls. They are:

• Avraham
• Yitzchak
• Yaakov
• Moshe
• Aharon

16
https://judaism.stackexchange.com/questions/17054/what-is-the-kiss-of-death

34
 • Miriam

The Rambam17 explains that this form of death is when the prophets meditate so much about the
greatness of G-d, and their desire to cleave to G-d is so strong that their soul leaves their body.

He says all prophets had a lower form of this, but Moshe, Aharon, and Miriam experienced the
epitome of this, which is why the Talmud singles them out. (I'm assuming he doesn't mention the
Avot, because he's focusing on the verse "By the mouth of G-d" which is where the Talmud learns
that Moshe, Aharon, and Miriam passed away in this manner.)

In kabbalah there is a very specific technical explanation of ‫( מיתה בנשיקה‬literally "death via
kiss"). See Emek HaMelech section "Gate of Tohu", Chapter 6718

17
at the end of Volume 3, Chapter 51 of his Guide to the Perplexed,
18
Hebrewbooks link - around the second column.

35
One of the principal spiritual workings of creation is via ‫( יחודים‬unions). One specific union is
‫( נשיקין‬kissing), in turn there is a "higher" and "lower" form of this union. The higher refers to the
union of the sfirot of Chochma and Bina, and is accomplished by the recital of the Shema. The
lower union is via reciting Baruch Shem after the shema.

The principal of ‫( מסירת נפש‬giving over one's soul) during the recital of the shema is the same as
giving ones soul over during death i.e. ideally a person should have the proper intention of creating
that union both during recital of the shema and even during death - and that would be "death by
kiss". See there at great length where he explains how Moshe's death by kiss was via the union of
Chochma and Bina ‫ אהיה‬and ‫ יהוה‬forming the name ‫יאההויהה‬, yet it is limited to an outward facet
as hinted at "kiss" (the mouth is for speech, an externally-oriented organ, for Moshe was on the
level of ‫ פה אל פה אדבר בו‬- "mouth to mouth I speak with him").

The Emek HaMelech has lengthy discussions about the non-kiss type of death, i.e. death by ‫קידוש‬
‫( השם‬sanctification of G-ds Name or martyrdom, which is a painful death). This type of death is
that of the 10 martyrs and in particular Rabi Akiva who longed for that type of death, in order to
manifest the more essential union (‫)גופא בגופא ורוחא ברוחא‬. Indeed he merited this, as he ended up
dying while saying shema in the midst of torture.

36
 The Kiss, Gustav Klimt 1907–1908.

The Kiss - From Metaphor to Mysticism

“Oh, let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth…” Song of Songs 1:2.

Allegorical interpretation in midrash and the Zohar understand the male lover being

beckoned as God, but whom is God kissing and why? And does kabbalistic interpretation leave

any room for human love?

Prof. Joel Hecker writes:19

The Song of Songs opens with a young woman, perhaps musing with her friends, yearning for the
intimacies of her beloved. The poetic alliteration of its first two verses heightens the sensuality of
the sentiment:

Song of Songs of Solomon. Oh, let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth…[1]

The frank eroticism of the young woman’s longing is plain, and belies the truth of Herman
Hupfeld’s famous lyric, “A kiss is just a kiss.” Nevertheless, a kiss is not always romantic. In the
words of English historian Keith Thomas, the kiss can express “deference, obedience, respect,

19
https://www.thetorah.com/article/the-kiss-from-metaphor-to-mysticism

37
agreement, reverence, adoration, friendliness, affection, tenderness, love, superiority, inferiority,
even insult. There is no such thing as a straightforward kiss.”[2]

If this is true of kisses between people, it is even truer for kisses in the Song of Songs, a work of
literature that has long been interpreted as an allegory for God’s love.[3] The kiss, consequently,
must come from God, but what does it mean to receive a divine kiss and who is receiving it? The
history of Jewish allegorical and symbolic interpretation offers many answers to these questions.

1: An Angel’s Kiss for Accepting God’s Commandment

Song of Songs Rabbah, the 9th century[4] midrash collection, offers multiple interpretations of the
question: what does it mean to receive a divine kiss? One such interpretation, quoted in the name
of the 3rd cent. C.E. Galilean sage Rabbi Yochanan interprets the kiss as the divine response to
Israel’s accepting the commandments. However, to limit the anthropomorphism entailed in God
kissing each Israelite, this interpretation replaces God with individualized angels:

38
R. Yochanan’s reading removes any tinge of romance or closeness between God and the Israelites
receiving the proxy kiss. The non-erotic kiss serves to seal the deal after the various Israelites
accept their part of the bargain.

2: The Kiss as Symbol for a Commandment

In a succeeding passage of the same collection, R. Joshua, a 2nd cent. Judean sage, interprets the
kiss as a symbol for the commandments themselves:

In this instance, the focus is on the preposition ‫ִמן‬, typically “from,” in the phrase ‫נשיקות‬-‫מ‬
‫פיהו‬, from [among] the kisses of his mouth.[5] Following the rabbinic principle that an indefinite
plural means two (‫ שנים‬...‫)מיעוט‬,[6] R. Joshua reads the verse as the equivalent of saying “God
should kiss me with two kisses.”

He reads this verse as a reference to God’s direct revelation of the first two commandments of the
Decalogue.[7] Whereas in the Torah, the people complain about God speaking, asking Moses to
intercede on their behalf as a conduit, this verse expresses a positive reaction to having twice been
“kissed by God,” i.e., having heard two divine commandments directly from God.

3: The Divine Kiss of Death

The third interpretation in Song of Songs Rabbah interprets the kiss as a metaphor for the painless
death with which righteous people are rewarded. The text begins with the opinion of R. Nehemiah
(2nd cent. C.E.):

39
The unusual Hebrew term shukyotehon “their desire,” is an alliterative pun on the word for kiss
(neshika), and the connection is later made explicit:

Next, the text quotes an obscure sage, Rabbi Azariah, who argues that Moses, Aaron, and Miriam
all died from the kiss.

'‫ ַוַיַּﬠל ַאֲהֹרן ַהֹכֵּהן ֶאל ֹהר ָהָהר ַﬠל ִפּי ה‬:‫ ֲהָדא הוּא ִדְכִתיב‬,‫ָאַמר ַרִבּי ֲﬠַז ְרָיה ָמָצאנוּ ֶשַׁנְּפשׁוֹ ֶשׁל ַאֲהֹרן ל ֹא ִנְטָּלה ֶאָלּא ִבּ ְנִשׁיָקה‬
‫ ַמה ָשּׁם‬,‫ ַוָתָּמת ָשׁם ִמ ְרָים‬:‫ ִדְּכִתיב‬,‫ ִמ ְרָים ִמַנּ ִין‬.'‫ ַוָיָּמת ָשׁם מֶשׁה ֶﬠֶבד ה' ַﬠל ִפּי ה‬:‫ ֶשֶׁנֱּאַמר‬,‫ ְוַנְפשׁוֹ ֶשׁל מֶשׁה ִמַנּ ִין‬.‫ַוָיָּמת ָשׁם‬
.‫ ֶאָלּא ֶשְׁגַּנאי ְלָפ ְרשׁוֹ‬,‫ ַאף ָכּאן ֵכּן‬,'‫ֶשֶׁנֱּאַמר ְלַהָלּן ַﬠל ִפּי ה‬

40
The biblical proof is based on the biblical phrase ‫על פי י"י‬, “from the mouth of YHWH,” which he
understands literally, i.e., by a kiss from God’s mouth.[10] The text then expands the group of
people who will be rewarded with this death:

According to this imagery, God’s kiss is God’s way of bringing the beloved Torah scholar
painlessly into the divine realm at the time of transition from this world to the next.

Philosophical Adaptation: Maimonides

In his philosophical work, The Guide of the Perplexed, Moses Maimonides (1138–1204) adapts
the rabbinic concept of death by the kiss, describing it as mystical union with the Active
Intellect,[11] the entity responsible for the maintenance of this world in Maimonides’ philosophy
(Guide, 3.51):

Their purpose was to indicate that the three of them died in the pleasure of this apprehension due
to the intensity of passionate love. In this dictum the Sages… followed the generally accepted
poetical way of expression that calls the apprehension that is achieved in a state of intense and

41
passionate love for Him, may He be exalted, a kiss, in accordance with its dictum: “Let him kiss
me with the kisses of his mouth,” and so on. [The Sages]… mention the occurrence of this kind of
death, which in true reality is salvation from death, only with regard to Moses, Aaron, and
Miriam.[12]

While the intention of the rabbinic teaching is more modest, indicating only that these biblical
heroes died painlessly, without the horror of confronting the Angel of Death, Maimonides turns it
into a moment of divestment of coarse materiality and ecstatic union. Kissing is now a purely
figurative way of speaking of the transmutation of the perfected philosophical mind at the point of
death.

Kabbalistic Adaptation: Kisses as Mystical Rapture in Life

Shortly after the death of Maimonides in 1204, kabbalists in Spain begin to write down and publish
mystical traditions that were previously transmitted orally or that they themselves created. Among
the first of these literary pioneers was the Catalan kabbalist R. Ezra of Gerona (13th cent., a
contemporary of Naḥmanides), who was the first to write a kabbalistic commentary on the Song
of Songs.[13]

In contrast to Maimonides, for whom the figurative kiss of rapture comes only at death, Ezra places
the hope for kisses in the mouth of the individual soul who pines for mystical union with God in
this life. He writes,

In Ezra’s rendition of the kisses between God and devotee, the kissing imagery symbolizes the
dual exchange that occurs in mystical union. It first symbolizes the desire and joy of the soul as it

42
cleaves upwards, fusing with Divinity, here called Kavod, “Glory.”[15] Second, it represents the
soul’s spiritual transformation through the downward infusion of holy spirit into the individual.
The focus here is not the moment of death, but the ongoing spiritual dynamics in the life of the
mystic.[16]

The final point, that the soul speaks with the Glory derekh nistar has a dual meaning here. In
kabbalistic literature, the term means “in an esoteric manner,” and could be taken to be descriptive
of the doctrines being taught. It is also a grammatical term, though, signifying the third person.

By using this term, Ezra is alluding to the homiletical hook for his reading, namely, that the voice
of the female lover speaks to her beloved in the third person (Oh, let him…). Since it is the human
soul addressing the immanent aspect of God, the Song of Songs formulated the wish in a respectful
manner.[17]

4: Masculine and Feminine Aspects of God

The Zohar, the central and canonical Jewish text of Jewish mysticism that was produced largely
in late 13th–early 14th century Castile, is written as mystical midrash, and is charged with erotic
energies. Verses from the Song of Songs are interpreted and reinterpreted throughout its many
pages.[18] In this case, the Zohar shifts the imagery from God kissing Israel to masculine and
feminine aspects of the divine kissing each other.

Under the influence of Greek philosophy as absorbed through the writings of Muslim philosophers
and theologians, medieval Jewish thinkers wrestled with the chasm between a philosophically
abstract and transcendent deity on one hand, and the religious desires for a caring, watching, and
engaged God on the other. One of the strategies that emerged was to conceptualize God’s
transcendence and immanence, compassion and judgment, love and punishment as a series of
graded emanations, ten in all, called sefirot.

43
The performance of commandments, prayer, and Torah study were all now reimagined as the
instruments through which the kabbalist could unify those different aspects. They focused chiefly
on the masculine aspect or potency of divinity called the “blessed Holy One” and the feminine
aspect/potency of divinity, called “Shekhinah” or “Assembly of Israel.”[19] For the kabbalists, then,
the Song of Songs describes the love that obtains between these two facets of God.

The Zohar begins by seeking to explicate the reason for the very human metaphor of kissing, as
opposed to a more ethereal or abstract term such as love.

The Song of Songs, explains R. Yitzhak, employs daring anthropomorphic imagery (kiss-breath-
mouth-spirit) in order to talk about the intra-divine romance with the dynamics of intimacy, rather
than the perceived sterility of more philosophical terminology.

44
One distinctive element here is the projection of ru’aḥ onto the masculine and feminine divine
aspects. The Zohar relies upon the rabbinic model of a human being kissed by God/ru’aḥ as a
paradigm for Shekhinah/Assembly of Israel asking for a kiss so that She can be united with the
masculine aspect of God above.

Consolidating many of the earlier traditions that we have seen above, this passage solicits all of
their meanings to render the meaning of Shekhinah’s call for kisses. She wants the union that
comes with the kiss for the righteous at death, the intimacy that links two lovers as promised in
Genesis 2:24, and the union that the pious mystic seeks with God.

The kabbalistic symbolism of the Zohar presents the human model of kissing as the ideal metaphor
to describe the intra-divine romance. It is the embodied quality and experience of the kiss that
enables the kiss between human beings to teach directly and explicitly about kisses between
different rungs of the Godhead.

What is “His Mouth”?

The embodied nature of the kissing metaphor becomes more acute when the Zohar turns its gaze
to the slightly unusual form of the term pihu, his mouth. In the Zohar’s commentary on the Song
of Songs, the mystical midrashim are presented in a dialogue between Rabbi Shim'on bar Yochai
and Elijah. The latter remarks on the unusual pronoun form ‫( פיהו‬pihu), in contrast to the Bible’s
prevailing form ‫(פיו‬piv).[21]

45
The act of uttering the word pihu (rather than piv) puckers the lips, a visual performance that
demonstrates the woman’s readiness for a kiss. More than just cute, the Zohar here reads the Song
of Songs as a verbal enactment of divine love, in which the embodied enactment of the text mirrors
and models the love that is pursued by the enigmatic cycle of songs.

More esoterically, in the Kabbalah’s decoding of every term, and often every letter in Scripture,
as symbols pointing toward divine dynamics. The form of the letter ‫( ו‬vav) of the word ‫( פיו‬piv) is
viewed as masculine, so by the logic of kabbalistic linguistics the phrase His mouth apparently
omits any orthographic representation of the feminine.

By using the word ‫( פיהו‬pihu) which inserts the letter ‫( ה‬heh), written with an opening at the bottom
and thus conceptualized as feminine, the pihu form of the word juxtaposes the letter ‫( ה‬heh),
representing the feminine Shekhinah, with the letter ‫( ו‬vav), representing the blessed Holy One.
This form thereby signifies the union of the masculine and the feminine potencies within divinity.
The letters of the word are marshalled to demonstrate that intimacy between the different aspects
of God occurs on the literal level of the letter.

5: Back to Human Love

While the Zohar’s readings stress events in the celestial realms, its exegesis leaves room for
reading the verse as human kissing as well:

46
In the exchange of breath that occurs through kissing, spirits join—as each one gives of his or her
own spirit while partaking of the spirit of the other. This engenders four spirits, united as
one.[24] The math here is admittedly a bit curious: two companions infuse each other with spirit,
even as their own indigenous spirit remains. As a result, each has their own spirit and that of the
other’s, yielding a total of four.

Arriving at the number four is like winning the kabbalistic lottery. Since there are four letters in
the tetragrammaton and four creatures supporting Ezekiel’s divine chariot, if two people have
attained a quality of ‘four-ness’ through the merging of four lips in holy union with each other
they have effectively created a resting place for Divinity.

To put it differently, when people kiss, they are participating in an immanence of the intra-divine
kisses. The text continues, reinforcing this claim:

The paradigm for kisses of love is the pattern of those exchanged between upper spirit and lower
spirit, and the blessed Holy One and Shekhinah, respectively. The human kisses that the text
celebrates are those that partake of the primordial sefirotic union—the loving kisses that transcend
human history and creation altogether.[25]

Thus, as the Zohar reads it, the paradigm of the kisses in the Song of Songs occur in the divine
realm, but we humans, through recognizing love’s origins in that supernal dimension, participate
in the immanence of the intra-divine kisses and can participate in that same love.

Footnotes

47
1. This article derives in part from Joel Hecker, “Kissing Kabbalists: Hierarchy, Reciprocity, and Equality” in Studies in

Jewish Civilization: Love—Ideal and Real—in the Jewish Tradition from the Hebrew Bible to Modern Times, edited by

Leonard J. Greenspoon, Ronald A. Simkins, and Jean A. Cahan (Omaha, Nebraska: Creighton University Press, 2008,

171–208). I extend much thanks to TheTorah.com editor's for significantly improving this article.

2. Keith Thomas, “Afterword,” in The Kiss in History, ed. Karen Harvey (Manchester: Manchester University Press,

2005), 188.

3. The startling inclusion of the Song of Songs in the biblical canon prompted readings that removed the Song from the

domain of human sexuality, such that Rabbi Akiva both directed readers to the proper theological understanding of the

work, while warning against reading it according to its plain meaning. For his advocacy of an allegorizing reading, see

m. Yadayim 3:5: “…the whole world is not as worthy as the day on which the Song of Songs was given to Israel; for all

the writings are holy, but the Song of Songs is the Holy of Holies.” On his admonition against reading the Song of

Songs in taverns, see Tosefta Sanhedrin 12:5.

4. While this is the date of the work’s editing, the work is based on midrashim that likely go back to the Talmudic period.

5. For the partitive meaning of this preposition, see Paul Joüon and Tamitsu Muraoka, A Grammar of Biblical Hebrew,

3rd reprint of 2nd ed. with corrections, Subsidia Biblica 27 (Roma: G&B press, 2011), 460 [§133e].

6. E.g., Sifrei Numbers 145, j. Berakhot 1:1, b. Niddah 38b. These examples are just for illustrative purposes; the

principle is ubiquitous.

7. According to one rabbinic interpretation, God spoke only the first two commandments of the Decalogue. See Kenneth

Seeskin, “What Did the People Hear at Mount Sinai?” TheTorah (2021); Baruch Schwartz, “What Really Happened at

Mount Sinai?” TheTorah (2013).

8. The text next quotes a second opinion, that of R. Judah, making a similar point.

9. The final point applies this death to Miriam, explaining that the Torah didn’t think it would be appropriate to talk about

God’s mouth kissing a woman. The idea that these three individuals died by the kiss is familiar already from the

Babylonian Talmud (Moed Katan 28a, Baba Batra 17a), and can also be found in Midrash Tanna’im, Deuteronomy

34:5; Deuteronomy Rabbah 11:10; Midrash Tanchuma, Va’ethannan 6; and Fathers According to Rabbi Nathan A

12:4.

10. In context, the phrase probably means “at YHWH’s command,” since both Aaron and Moses were told to go up a

mountain and die at that moment.

48
11. See Adam Afterman, ‘And They Shall Be One Flesh’: On the Language of Mystical Union in Judaism (Brill, Leiden:

2016), 102–120.

12. Moses Maimonides, The Guide of the Perplexed, trans. Shlomo Pines (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1963),

2.627–28.

13. He is also one of the first to mainstream kabbalistic teachings, even as its symbolism remained somewhat obscure and

esoteric.

14. Ezra of Gerona, “Commentary on the Song of Songs,” in Kitvei Rabbenu Moshe Ben Nahman, ed. Charles Chavel

(Jerusalem: Mossad ha-Rav Kook, 1988), 485. See also Zohar 2:256b; cf. Joseph Gikatilla, Sefer Sha’arei

Ẓedek (Brooklyn: Moriah Offset Co., 1985), 3a; Eleazar ben Yehudah of Worms, Shirat Ha-Roke’ah: The Poems of

Rabbi Eleazar Ben Yehudah of Worms (Jerusalem, 1993), 27.

15. In Kabbalah, “Glory” is a technical term referring to Shekhinah, whose nature will be elaborated below.

16. See Wolfson, Language, Eros, Being, 349–350. See also, Arthur Green, “The Song of Songs in Early Jewish

Mysticism,” in The Heart of the Matter: Studies in Jewish Mysticism and Theology, Jewish Publication Society,

Philadelphia: 2015, 107–110.

17. For a discussion of the grammar in this phrase, see Marc Zvi Brettler, “Enallage in the Bible,” TheTorah (2018).

18. For the Zohar’s thinking on sefirot, see Arthur Green, A Guide to the Zohar (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press,

2004), 9–59.

19. See Isaiah Tishby, The Wisdom of the Zohar, trans. by David Goldstein, Littman Library of Jewish Civilization

(Oxford: 1989), 1.380-381; Green, A Guide to the Zohar, 50–52.

20. Zohar 2:124b; translation from Daniel Matt, The Zohar: Pritzker Edition (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2009),

5.167. ‫( רוחא‬Ruḥa) means “wind, breath, spirit.” On a kiss as “cleaving of ruḥa to ruḥa,” see Zohar 1:184a; 2:146a–b,

254a, 256b (last two Heikhalot); Zohar Ḥadash 60c (Midrash ha-Ne’lam on Shir ha-Shirim), 63a, 64b (both Shir ha-

Shirim); Moses ben Shem Tov de León, The Book of the Pomegranate: Moses de León’s Sefer ha-Rimmon, ed. Elliot

R. Wolfson (Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1988), 396; idem, Sod Eser Sefirot Belimah, ed., Gershom Scholem, Kovetz al

Yad: New Series 8 (1976): 372.

21. Regarding the noun pe with a suffixed third-person masculine pronoun, the form piv appears 77 times in the Hebrew

Bible, while pihu appears 22 times. This difference may be one of dialect.

22. Zohar Ḥadash 63d (Shir ha-Shirim). Translation from Joel Hecker, The Zohar: Pritzker Edition (Stanford: Stanford

University Press, 2016), 11.377–378.

23. Zohar Ḥadash 64b (Shir ha-Shirim). Translation Hecker, The Zohar, 11.384. A parallel version of this passage

continues, saying,

49
 All the more so with a man and woman: when joined, four ruḥot together. The son who proceeds from them—

ru’aḥ coming from four ruḥot. This is as is said: From four ruḥot come, O ru’aḥ (Isaiah 11:2)—this is a

complete ru’aḥ.”
Zohar Ḥadash 60c (Midrash ha-Ne’lam on Shir ha-Shirim). Translation from Hecker, The Zohar, 11.3–4.

What emerges from comparing these two passages is that while there is a decided valuing of the homoerotic exchange

of kisses (albeit decidedly not sexual), heterosexual kissing which can ultimately lead to intercourse, conception, and

birth is more highly prized. Indeed, this latter passage opens with the following exaltation of the potential that can

emerge from such kissing:

Rabbi Reḥumai opened, “The ‫( רוח‬ru’aḥ), spirit, of YHWH will alight upon him, ru’aḥ of wisdom and understanding,

ru’aḥ of counsel and power, ru’aḥ of knowledge and awe of YHWH (Isaiah 11:2). Here are four ‫( רוחות‬ruḥot), spirits,

and none has attained them other than King Messiah alone.”

Nothing less than the messiah himself might be the ultimate product of a kiss! On homoeroticism in Kabbalah, see

Wolfson, Language, Eros, Being, 363–371.

24. On four spirits forming through a kiss, see Zohar 2:146b; Moses de León, Sod Eser Sefirot Belimah, 372.

25. On the motif of mystical union through kissing, see Zohar 2:254a–b; ZḤ 60c–d (MhN, ShS); Moses de León, Sefer ha-

Rimmon, 396; Fishbane, Kiss of God; Kosman, “Breath, Kiss, and Speech”; Hellner-Eshed, A River Flows from Eden,

296–300; Wolfson, Language, Eros, Being, 348–52, 361–62; Hecker, “Kissing Kabbalists”; Tanja Werthmann, “‘Spirit

to Spirit’: The Imagery of the Kiss in the Zohar and its Possible Sources,” in Harvard Theological Review 111:4

(2018), 686–609.

50
 The Kiss of God: Spiritual and Mystical Death in Judaism by
Michael Fishbane
Paul Mendes-Flohr writes:20

20
History of Religions , Nov., 1997, Vol. 37, No. 2,
https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdf/3176344.pdf?refreqid=excelsior%3Aeb3632a923de2f4c2ebfdcdb540317c5&ab_segments=&ori
gin=

51
52
53
54
 Courtesy of Yeshiva University Archives

A Portrait of The Rav

STANLEY BOYLAN WRITES:21

Throughout the year 5778, which marked the twenty-fifth yahrtzeit of the Rav, we have sought
to present different facets of his complex and brilliant personality to the broader public. As the
year closes, Rabbi Dr. Stanley Boylan recalls the fundamental role the Rav played in his life
and learning.

At the entrance to my home, there hangs a portrait of my rebbe, Rabbi Yosef Ber Soloveitchik,
with which my wife surprised me a number of years ago. This portrait of the Rav depicts him more
or less as I remember him when I was his talmid, his eyes peering out of thick glasses with an
inquisitive but demanding look. His image watches me as I come and go, and reminds me of things
that I have yet to learn and of the role he played in my life and learning. At my office at Touro
College, there is a different portrait of the Rav, a computer-generated image from an earlier
photograph. While I can clearly discern the Rav’s features in this portrait, the photograph on which
it is based was not taken during the period when I was his talmid. In this portrait, the Rav appears

21
https://jewishaction.com/the-rav/a-portrait-of-the-rav/

55
as ever, masterful, and here, too, I am inspired by the intellectual majesty and moral integrity
radiating from his penetrating gaze, but I have more difficulty recognizing my beloved rebbe in it.

At this twenty-fifth yahrtzeit of the Rav, there are indeed various portraits being drawn of him,
many of them true to the vision and experiences of the individuals composing them. Some are even
written by individuals from a new generation—the “dor asher lo yada et Yosef”—who
experienced the Rav’s brilliance only from his writings or from his recorded lectures; other
portraits are composed by those who never truly recognized him at all, “v’heim lo hikiruhu.” Some
portraits may actually distort the image of the Rav and what he stood for, so those of us who had
the zechut (privilege) of learning directly from the Rav have an obligation to present our vision of
this great man and his personal impact. The impact that a rebbe has on his talmidim is ultimately
much greater than the individual chiddushei Torah he taught. It is the unique personality of
the rebbe as he approaches the learning process and the challenges presented to him that etch
themselves into the talmid and change his thinking and his life.

There is great value in preserving before oneself the image of one’s teacher, of one’s rebbe. The
Gemara in Eruvin 13b states:

The image of Rabbi Meir, even from the back, transformed Rabbi Yehudah HaNasi and made him
Rebbe, the teacher of all generations. We all know that Yosef HaTzaddik, when confronted with
great temptation, was similarly saved by the image of his father Yaakov, which appeared before
him (Sotah 36b). Interestingly, the Rav quotes this passage from Sotah as the preamble to his
magnum opus, Ish Ha-Halakhah (Halakhic Man), where he sketches an image of his own great
teachers and forebearers.

His Torah and teaching are being learned mainly without exposure to the force of his
personality, which itself left such an indelible impression; without his sense of humor; without
the intensity of his passion. Of course, we learned from the Rav’s Torah, but being exposed to
his own persona was a limud in itself.

The Rav himself, in a hesped that he delivered over a gadol who had passed away, described the
difficulties in presenting a full picture of the niftar (the deceased) by referring to a passage in the
Talmud (Moed Katan 25a). When Rav Huna, the great Amora, passed from this world,
the aron (coffin) in which he had been placed was too wide to pass through the door of Rav Huna’s
house. Various attempts to solve this problem were rejected, including transferring him to a
narrower aron, as it was regarded as being disrespectful to the deceased. Finally, they simply broke
down the doorway to enable the aron to exit. So too, the Rav explained, when a gadol passes away,
those entrusted with conveying his essence through well-defined passageways, the windows of
their own soul through which they perceived the gadol, somehow fail to encompass the true
greatness of the individual. The attempt is made to contain the gadol within the routine categories
within which we define other individuals and ourselves, resulting in making the gadol appear
smaller. If one wishes to have access to the essence of the gadol, to appreciate his greatness, one
must break down one’s individual narrow vision and see the gadol in the entirety of his
contributions and his personality.

56
This insight certainly applies to the Rav, who defied easy categorization because of the richness
of his spirit, the brilliance of his intellect and the moral integrity of the true man of faith. He
encompassed simultaneously an abiding dedication to the mesorah of his distinguished forebearers
as well as his vision of chiddush (original interpretations) in Torah as a primary creative exercise.
And so, we find profiles of the Rav by those who approach him from a single line of vision—either
seeking to emphasize the modern at the expense of the mesorah, or confining the Rav to areas in
which he was, indeed, most comfortable, within the daled amot of halachah. Twenty-five years
after his passing, we who experienced the Rav’s brilliance on a continual basis, primarily within
the context of the give and take of Talmudic exposition, still learn of and learn from the breadth
of the Rav’s vision and teachings.

The Rav defined himself as a melamed—a term of honor, since it is the term used with regard to
Hashem in Birkat HaTorah (“Hamelamed Torah l’amo Yisrael”)—and talmud Torah was the very
essence of his purpose in life. He would quote a family maxim: “In order to be a gadol, you had
to grow up among gedolim.” (Needless to say, the Rav’s talmidim, by and large, did not grow up
among gedolim.) The Rav had a great and unique mesorah of Torah Shebe’al Peh from his father,
Rav Moshe Soloveichik, and his grandfather, Rav Chaim Brisker, whose chiddushei Torah were
inevitably expressed in virtually every shiur. While other students of Rav Chaim had also broadly
mastered the fundamentals of applying the Brisker derech, in the hands of the Rav it was the
methodology of a genius applied by another genius. The Rav felt that man was commanded to be
creative, just as Hashem is a Creator, and that this creativity could be expressed through talmud
Torah and the power of chiddush. In teaching Torah, the Rav was also literally creating and
transforming talmidim; he applied the principle of “Uman koneh b’shvach keli—the craftsman is
given dominion over the object he creates” to the rebbe who forms and transforms his students.

The Rav at a luncheon by the faculty of RIETS. From left: The Rav, then-YU
President Dr. Samuel Belkin and YU Rosh Yeshivah Rabbi Mendel Zaks

And the Rav was a master craftsman. During the period of my sojourn in the Rav’s shiur, our class
consisted of many of the Rav’s leading talmidim who would ultimately transcribe his Torah
teachings and give it over to future generations of talmidim; others would later assume the
leadership of American Orthodoxy.1 One of the secrets of the Rav’s masterful pedagogy was an

57
abiding openness to new approaches to a sugya, both from himself and even from talmidim. The
Rav would start with a seemingly fresh look at a sugya or text, with no preconceived explanation,
but of course his approach inevitably fell within the overall Brisker framework. He would solicit
or insist on answers from talmidim; the Rav would not always agree with a student’s formulation,
but not being prepared for or involved in the shiur was a fatal flaw, to be avoided at all costs. On
one occasion when the Rav’s discussion was especially intense, he called upon me, and I told him
that I had a totally different peshat in the sugya. To my surprise, the Rav simply allowed me to
learn it differently. On other occasions, he would seriously examine approaches that differed from
his own. On the other hand, when I offered a routine peshat (“cheftza-gavra”) the Rav rejected it
as too facile for the problem being discussed. For the record, the Rav did not allow any so-called
“secular” knowledge to impact on the shiurim that he gave, which were purely Torah.

The Rav venerated intellectual honesty and elevated the desire for amito shel Torah (the truth of
Torah) above all else. In transmitting Torah, he sought to teach his students not merely to know
the Torah text that he was teaching, but to know how to think about the text, how to examine the
nuances, the difficulties and the seeming paradoxes in the explanations provided, even those that
he himself advanced. A shiur might start with the Rav’s rendering of Rav Chaim’s peshat in
the sugya, truly brilliant in itself, then expand upon it to question which cases the explanation
might truly apply to and whether there were approaches intimated by the Rishonim. Living with
the great mesorah of Brisk, the Rav interpreted that mesorah to incorporate the exploration of new
approaches to be subsumed in a future mesorah that he and his talmidim might create.

At the end of the shiur, the Rav would seek to encapsulate the lesson by asking, “What did we
learn today?” Since he was only in New York three days a week, each shiur could run for multiple
hours before he would ask this question, and, in reviewing the shiur, the Rav might experience
difficulty with an explanation or principle that he had elucidated and might well decide that it
needed another formulation. This could turn into another shiur, but he would not give up until he
was satisfied, and, on rare occasions, he would pronounce the principle “amito shel Torah.” On
other occasions, he might return to the sugya the following week, until he was truly satisfied. After
all the discussions and deliberations, the Rav wanted to make sure that the final lesson would be
as he had anticipated, or that it would be defined with sufficient rigor to meet his standards.

It may be precisely this which renders the Rav so unforgettable to his talmidim, because we either
seek out his approach to a perplexing sugya, or in other instances, remember how he would
encourage us to think creatively and explore other possibilities, always within the overall halachic
structure of kol haTorah kulah, which was his given. There is a danger, of course,
that talmidim who perhaps did not learn all that the Rav had to teach and did not absorb the lesson
of amito shel Torah, might mistake his encouragement of openness for a disregard for
the mesorah and the intellectual discipline and tension which accompanies it. That each individual
section of Talmudic text could be mastered and understood in the context of a
universal mesorah was his true lesson to us all. It is incredible that the Rav, who spent so much
intellectual energy on deciphering and explicating so meticulously and articulately the opinions of
the giants of Jewish tradition, might be cited as a source for those seeking to undermine the
authority of that self-same tradition. Anyone using the Rav’s open approach to talmidim to
advance his own personal agenda has failed to grasp the very core of the Rav’s methodology and
values and may not have been a talmid at all.

58
As a student in Yeshiva College, it was my greatest desire to gain entrance into the Rav’s shiur,
although entry at the time was limited to those students pursuing semichah (ordination).
My chavruta and I, braver souls then than we are today, undertook to sit in on the Rav’s shiur.
Having attended other shiurim based on the Brisker “canon,” I remember thinking at that first
experience with the Rav’s shiur—the Rav was learning Kiddushin—that the experience was like
a transformation from black-and-white to color, where a rainbow of possibilities and
interpretations suddenly appeared before me. Unfortunately, I had to wait another year until the
Rav’s shiur was opened up to Yeshiva College students. After recounting this experience, I
received a call from an individual working with tapes of the Rav’s shiurim who was trying to date
the Kiddushin shiurim. I realized that I could now, after all these years, finally hear the
Rav’s shiurim on Kiddushin.

In some sense, the Rav is even more accessible today to talmidim and the broader public—via
published reconstructions of shiurim and through recordings and media outlets. It is breathtaking
to read the Rav’s brilliant formulations of ideas that he would explicate in the future, already
referenced in the Iggerot HaGrid HaLevi and Iggerot HaGram v’HaGrid, which were based on
his letters to his father and others. The Rav’s thoughts on the Yamim Noraim now elevate and
inspire us and Klal Yisrael throughout those holiest of days, and his reflections on Kinot and on
Chumash are now cogently and movingly presented for all to read. However, with the publication
of such fine works, there have been striking, perhaps inevitable, changes in the manner in which
the Rav is perceived for posterity. Learning in the Rav’s shiur or attending one of his public
lectures, it was always clear to us that the Rav was a genius at interpretation, with great sensitivity
to the nuances of the language of a text.

Interestingly, we did not regard the Rav as a spokesman for himself but, rather, as a revealer of
truths, sometimes received from his forebearers and sometimes uncovered by him through
his koach hachiddush. The Rav would use his great bekiut and marvelous logical (and

59
pedagogical) skills to present a persuasive argument. His teaching was not based on his own
personal authority as a religious leader or spokesman, but rather on the sources that he brought to
bear on a problem and the elegance of the solutions that he offered.

Over the years, the Rav himself has become the study of countless scholars, and his teachings seen
as original thinking derived from his own religious sensibilities; however, although the Rav
admitted to a keen halachic intuition, by and large he followed the minhagim (traditions) of his
family (often minhag HaGra or the minhag of the yeshivot of Lithuania) in his own practice. As a
teacher of generations, the Rav always sought to derive a position on a controversial issue from
the sources of authentic Jewish authority. The Rav’s voice was an echo of the kol miSinai,
advocating lamdut, not liberalization, addressed to modernity but not the call of a modernizer.

Following a family tradition, the Rav published relatively little, quoting the maxim, “Not
everything that one thinks should one say, not everything one says should one write down, and not
everything one writes down should one publish.”

Given the Rav’s meticulous standards of excellence and attention to detail, many of those items
published by talmidim and others in his name might well have been held back from publication by
the Rav, largely to the detriment of the world of his talmidim and the Olam HaTorah. Because of
the Rav’s particular derech halimud (methodology of learning), which incorporated new
approaches specifically to open up the minds of his talmidim, we do not always know, and cannot
know, the Rav’s final opinion, whether the chiddush or brilliancy captured by the talmid or the
recorder reflected “sof da’ato,” whether it would have met his criteria in the review, “What did we
learn today?” Ironically, the Rav’s Torah may now have a wider audience than in his lifetime, but
with some uncertainty as to whether the Rav himself would have imparted this particular thought
for posterity.

And if the Rav’s thought is, indeed, more present, his absence is also more profoundly felt, because
his Torah and teachings are being learned mainly without exposure to the force of his personality—
which itself left such an indelible impression; without his sense of humor; without the intensity of
his passion. Of course we learned from the Rav’s Torah, but being exposed to his own persona
was a limud in itself.

The impact that a rebbe has on his talmidim is ultimately much greater than the
individual chiddushei Torah he taught—it is the unique personality of the rebbe as he
approaches the learning process and the challenges presented to him that etches itself onto
the talmid and changes his thinking and his life.

The Rav was not an isolated professor of Talmud delivering Olympian-style lectures, but a flesh-
and-blood rebbe. He was often surrounded by devoted talmidim who developed close and lifelong
relationships with him. There was a period during which the Rav lost his brother and his wife
which was, indeed, a difficult period for him. We, all the talmidim of the shiur, traveled together
to visit him for shivah in Boston. Subsequently, when he came back to Yeshiva, he
learned Masechet Moed Katan and hilchot aveilut, which was his way of expressing his loss
through the limud of Torah.

After a shiur, the Rav was often surrounded by loving talmidim looking for clarification on a part
of the shiur or posing a new halachic question for resolution. On one occasion, one of his

60
favorite talmidim brought his kallah to meet the Rav and asked for a berachah. This was not in the
realm of usual requests, and the Rav shyly responded, “I am not a Chassidishe rebbe,” reflecting
his Litvish upbringing. He gave the berachah which was sought, of course, and which bore great
weight. When my son was of bar mitzvah age, I brought him up to Boston for a berachah from the
Rav, who was then confined to his home. There was no protest from the Rav this time, and
a berachah was forthcoming. (My son, now in Eretz Yisrael, has since mastered more Brisker
Torah than I ever will). When possible, the Rav would also intervene for his talmidim for positions,
when he could be helpful, and once even weighed in on a doctoral thesis defense on behalf of
a talmid. The Rav was a berachah to all of his talmidim, even if he wasn’t a Chassidishe rebbe!

For those of us familiar with the personality of the Rav, reading his works captured in print can
jog our memories and help us to re-experience the grandeur of his thought. My suggestion to those
encountering the Rav solely through print would be to listen to some of his shiurim, now widely
available online, to experience the dynamism and drama intrinsic in his personality in order to
understand the problems that he addressed, rather than merely the answers recorded in writing. We
are living in an age in which it is possible to capture somewhat the “achorai” of the Rav, if not to
experience the full gamut of his personality. And to do so is certainly necessary if we are to try to
be “omed al sof da’ato,” to know what the Rav might have expressed as his final opinion at the
end of the shiur when he would reflect, “And what did we learn today?”

Note
1. Rav Hershel Schachter, Rav Aharon Lichtenstein, Rav Menachem Genack and Rav Michel Shurkin are among his
great talmidim and transcribers. Future maggidei shiur include Rav Abba Bronspiegel, Rav Moshe Yaged, Rav
Mordechai Willig, Rav Yitzchak Ginsburg, Rav Aharon Kahn, Rav Chaim Ilson, Rav Ezra Bick, Rav Avishai David and
many others. The Rav’s nephew Rav Moshe Meiselman also learned with the Rav at that time privately in Boston.

Having discussed our daf’s minhagim on the death of a teacher and a Rebbe at the
“moment of death” when one tears kriah, and having discussed the “kiss” the misas
neshika in the bible and in midrash/Zohar, we now turn to the most infamous kiss of
all… the betrayal by Judas and how that fateful kiss has informed antisemitism for
a millennium..

61
 Il bacio della morte. Barcellona, Spagna

scultura che mostra la morte nelle vesti di uno scheletro alato che posa il suo
freddo bacio sul volto di un giovane, la cui espressione divide gli spettatori: è
rassegnazione quella che si percepisce, oppure estasi? Il Bacio Della Morte è una
scultura in marmo che si trova nel cimitero di Poblenou a Barcellona. Posta sulla
base di una tomba di un ragazzo morto negli anni ’30, rappresenta il rapporto
conflittuale, di attrazione e repulsione, dei giovani nei confronti della morte. È
tuttora aperto il dibattito sull’attribuzione dell’affascinate scultura, tra Jaume
Barba e Joan Fontbernat.

62
 Kiss of Judas (1304–06), fresco by Giotto, Scrovegni Chapel, Padua, Italy

The Kiss of Death

Judas kiss

a deceitful and treacherous kiss.

an act appearing to be an act of friendship, which is in fact harmful to the recipient.

63
 Judas in the New Testament, the Restoration, and the Gospel of
Judas

Frank F. Judd, Jr. writes:22

22
Source: Brigham Young University Studies , 2006, Vol. 45, No. 2

64
65
 Gospel expert says Judas was innocent
Patrick Cockburn writes:23

Was Judas the arch-traitor as portrayed in the New Testament? Or was his image built up from
slender evidence by the early Christian church as a symbol of the Jews betraying Christ?

In a radical rehabilitation of the historical reputation of Judas, Professor William Klassen says
there is limited evidence for seeing him as the greater betrayer. He believes that Judas did not
know he was sending Jesus to his death when he handed him over to the chief priests of the Temple
in Jerusalem.

Prof Klassen of the Ecole Biblique, a biblical research institution in Jerusalem, says that when he
was first commissioned to write a biography of Judas he assumed that the evidence would sustain
his reputation for treachery. Then he discovered that the gospels did not in fact say that Judas
"betrayed" Jesus but used the Greek verb paradidomi which in all other ancient texts means "to
hand over".

"At first I couldn't believe the word was so badly translated," says Prof Klassen. "This is the basis
of my case. Although I have been criticised, nobody has challenged me on the mis-translation of
the word."

He argues that there is little enough information about Judas in the New Testament - St Mark's
Gospel only mentions him three times - and that his reputation as the great betrayer developed
later as the early Christian church split from Judaism. Colourful details about Judas, such as the
belief he had red hair, were subsequent additions.

Prof Klassen says: "What our earliest sources say is that Judas did nothing until Jesus told him to
do it." When Judas led a band of armed men to the garden of Gethsemane and identified Jesus with
a kiss he could not have known that the chief priests were going to hand him over to Pontius Pilate,
the Roman prefect, to be crucified. In the Gospel of Matthew Judas hands back the 30 pieces of
silver as soon as he hears that Jesus is in the hands of the Romans saying: "I have betrayed innocent
blood."

It is only in the Gospel of St John, believed to have been written later than the others, that his role
gets more critical treatment. The key impulse behind his demonisation was the young church

23
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/gospel-expert-says-judas-was-innocent-1274417.html

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becoming increasingly anti- Jewish after the fall of Jerusalem. "The emerging church began to see
the need to draw boundaries," says Prof Klassen "and found Judas a convenient figure - for he was
a Jew and had been a disciple."

July 27, 2009

Caravaggio’s “The Taking of Christ.” Judas, Christianity’s primary image of

human evil, is now the subject of a rehabilitation effort

Betrayal
Should we hate Judas Iscariot?

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Joan Acocella writes:24

At the Last Supper, Jesus knew that it would be the last, and that he would be dead by the next
day. Each of the Evangelists tells the story differently, but, according to John, Jesus spent the time
he had left re-stating to the disciples the lessons he had taught them and trying to prop up their
courage. At a certain point, however, he lost heart. “Very truly,” he said to his men, “one of you
will betray me.” Who? they asked. And he answered, “It is the one to whom I give this piece of
bread when I have dipped it in the dish.” He then dipped a piece of bread into a dish and handed it
to Judas Iscariot, a disciple whom the Gospels barely mention before the scene of the Last Supper
but who now becomes very important. Once Judas takes the bread, Satan “entered into” him, John
says. Is that a metaphor, meaning that Jesus’ prediction enables Judas to betray him? Maybe so,
maybe not, but Jesus soon urges him directly. “Do quickly what you are going to do,” he says.
And so Judas gets up from the table and leaves. That night (or perhaps even before the Last
Supper), he meets with the priests of the Temple, makes the arrangements for the arrest, and
collects his reward, the famous thirty pieces of silver.

That is the beginning of Jesus’ end, and of Judas’s. Jesus is arrested within hours. Judas, stricken
with remorse, returns to the priests and tries to give them back their money. They haughtily refuse
it. Judas throws the coins on the floor. He then goes out and hangs himself. He dies before Jesus
does.

Did Judas deserve this fate? If Jesus informs you that you will betray him, and tells you to hurry
up and do it, are you really responsible for your act? Furthermore, if your act sets in motion the
process—Christ’s Passion—whereby humankind is saved, shouldn’t somebody thank you? No,
the Church says. If you betray your friend, you are a sinner, no matter how foreordained or
collaterally beneficial your sin. And, if the friend should happen to be the Son of God, so much
the worse for you.

For two thousand years, Judas has therefore been Christianity’s primary image of human evil.
Now, however, there is an effort to rehabilitate him, the result, partly, of an archeological find. In
1978 or thereabouts, some peasants digging for treasure in a burial cave in Middle Egypt came
upon an old codex—that is, not a scroll but what we would call a book, with pages—written in
Coptic, the last form of ancient Egyptian. The book has been dated to the third or fourth century,
but scholars believe that the four texts it contains are translations of writings, in Greek, from around
24
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2009/08/03/betrayal-2

68
the second century. When the codex was found, it was reportedly in good condition, but it then
underwent a twenty-three-year journey through the notoriously venal antiquities market, where it
suffered fantastic abuses, including a prolonged stay in a prospective buyer’s home freezer. (This
caused the ink to run when the manuscript thawed.) The book was cracked in half, horizontally;
pages were shuffled, torn out. By the time the codex reached the hands of restorers, in 2001, much
of it was just a pile of crumbs. The repair job took five years, after which some of the book was
still a pile of crumbs. Many passages couldn’t be read.

And then there was the strangeness of what could be read. In the twentieth century, Bible scholars
repeatedly had to deal with ancient books—the Dead Sea scrolls, the Nag Hammadi library—that
surfaced from the sands of the Middle East to wreak havoc with orthodoxy. These books said that
much of what we call Christian doctrine predated Christ; that the universe was created by a female
deity, and so on. The 1978 find—called the Codex Tchacos, for one of its successive owners,
Frieda Tchacos Nussberger—was even more surprising, because one of its texts, twenty-six pages
long, was entitled “The Gospel of Judas.” It wasn’t written by Judas. (We don’t know if there was
a historical Judas Iscariot.) It was a story about Judas, and in it the great villain, the Christ-killer,
was portrayed as Jesus’ favorite disciple, the only one who understood him.

The Codex Tchacos, like the Nag Hammadi library, was the work of an ancient religious party,
mostly Christian, that we call Gnostic. In the second century, Christianity was not an institution
but a collection of warring factions, each with its own gospels, each claiming direct descent from
Jesus, each accusing the others of heresy, homosexuality, and the like. In the fourth century, one
group, or group of groups, won out: the people now known as the proto-orthodox, because, once
they won, their doctrines became orthodoxy. The proto-orthodox were centrist. They embraced
both the Hebrew Bible and the new law proclaimed by Jesus; they said that Jesus was both God
and man; they believed that the world was both full of blessings and full of sin. Of the many
gospels circulating, they chose four, called Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, which, by reason of
their realism and emotional directness—their lilies of the field and prodigal sons—were most
likely to appeal to regular people.

The Gnostics were different—visionary, exclusionary. They scorned the Hebrew Bible; they said
that the world was utterly evil; they claimed that the key to salvation was not faith or good behavior
but secret knowledge, which was their exclusive property. The Gospel of Judas is entirely in line
with this view. In it, most people have no hope of getting to Heaven. As for Jesus, he was not a
man but wholly divine, and therefore Judas didn’t really have him killed. (Only a mortal can be

69
killed.) According to some commentators, this Jesus asked Judas to release him from the human
form he had assumed in order to descend to earth. Judas did him a favor.

That supposed exoneration of Judas was the most exclaimed-over aspect of the Gospel of Judas.
Far more shocking, however, was the book’s portrait of Jesus. We know Jesus from the New
Testament as an earnest and charitable man. Here, by contrast, he is a joker, and not a nice one.
Three times in this brief text, he bursts into laughter over his disciples’ foolishness. The first time,
he comes upon them as they are celebrating the Eucharist. What’s so funny? they ask him—this is
what we’re supposed to do. Maybe according to your god, Jesus says. But you represent our God,
they say. You’re his son. Jesus now turns on them. What makes you think you know me? he asks
them. “Truly I say to you, no generation of the people that are among you will know me.” In other
words, Jesus tells them that they are strangers to him. The next day, they ask him about Heaven,
and he laughs at them again. Forget about Heaven, he says. No mortal will go there. In response,
the disciples “did not find a word to say.”

No wonder, for Jesus has just denied what is said to have been his sole mission on earth, the
salvation of humankind. Later, he relents, a little: he says that some few mortals may be admitted
to Heaven. The text is hard to read here, but it appears that this elect is limited to the Gnostics.

Jesus’ dealings with the disciples occupy about half of the surviving pages of the Gospel of Judas.
The rest consists of a lecture that Jesus gives on cosmology—an account quite different from the
Bible’s. Briefly, the real God did not create the earth, but he spawned an angel, who created
thousands of other angels. Twelve “aeons” and seventy-two “luminaries” also came into existence,
and each luminary was supplied with five firmaments, for a total of three hundred and sixty. This
cosmos, as grand as it sounds, is described by Jesus as “corruption,” but apparently it is not as bad
as the earth, which was brought into being by a violent demiurge, Nebro, and his stupid assistant,
Saklas. The text goes on in this vein. N. T. Wright, in his book “Judas and the Gospel of Jesus:
Have We Missed the Truth about Christianity?” (2006), says that as a churchman—he is the Bishop
of Durham—he often gets letters that sound like the Judas gospel’s explanation of the universe:
“Some are handwritten, in which case they are mostly in green ink. Some are typewritten, page
after page of interminable cosmological speculation, with increasing amounts of block capitals and
underlinings.”

What use could this bizarre document be to modern Christians? Plenty. Many American religious
thinkers are more liberal than their churches. They wish that Christianity were more open—not a
stone wall of doctrine. To these people, the Gospel of Judas was a gift. As with the other Gnostic

70
gospels, its mere existence showed that there was no such thing as fixed doctrine, or that there
wasn’t at the beginning.

That implicit endorsement of tolerance was probably what American scholars valued most in the
Judas gospel, but the discovery gave them something else as well: righteous glee. What a joy to
have an ancient document in which the man singled out in the Bible as Christianity’s foremost
enemy turns out, arguably, to be Christ’s best friend. Hooray! The higher-ups don’t know
everything! This was also the appeal of the new gospel to the political left. For people who claimed
that the world was ruled by groups that controlled by marginalizing other groups, the Gospel of
Judas was like a keystone being hammered into place. Men had silenced women, colonialists had
silenced the colonized, and now we saw the Christian Church establishing itself by silencing other
Christian voices.

The gospel’s enthusiasts had a narrower political purpose, too. The most important fact about
Judas, apart from his betrayal of Jesus, is his connection with anti-Semitism. Almost since the
death of Christ, Judas has been held up by Christians as a symbol of the Jews: their supposed
deviousness, their lust for money, and other racial vices. The Bible scholar Louis Painchaud has
said that the current fad for rehabilitating Judas is a consequence of collective guilt over these
slanders and, above all, over the Holocaust. This must be true, at least in part. For anyone seeking
to defend and protect the Jews, disproving Judas’s guilt would seem a good place to start, and here
was an ancient gospel that appeared to support such a revision.

A number of people made special efforts to see that these lessons were learned. The restoration,
translation, and publication of the Gospel of Judas were paid for, in large measure, by the National
Geographic Society. This was an extremely expensive project, and the society wanted the gospel
valued accordingly—that is, as a bombshell. In the same month, April of 2006, that the society
published the first English translation, it also aired a television special and brought out a book—
Herbert Krosney’s “The Lost Gospel: The Quest for the Gospel of Judas Iscariot”—proclaiming
the document’s utterly revolutionary character. “It could create a crisis of faith,” one expert said
on the TV show. In both that show and the Krosney book, a lot of sensationalist formulas—the
voice from the beyond, the race against time, the some may call it treason—get a vigorous workout.

The trumpet calls were not confined to the mass media. Even the gospel’s translators may have
felt the need to augment its revisionist credentials. When Jesus, in the gospel, tells the disciples
that no mortal, or almost none, will be saved, one assumes that Judas will be an exception, and
that’s what National Geographic’s translators said in the first English edition. But then a number

71
of other scholars took a look at the Coptic text and objected that this was a misreading. The
translators must have seen their point, because in the second edition of their version, published last
year, the line has been changed—to mean the opposite. Jesus now says to Judas, “You will not
ascend on high” to join those in Heaven. In other passages, too, the second edition tells a widely
different story from the first.

In fairness, no expert can tell us exactly what the Coptic said. That is not just because of the terrible
condition of the codex; even when the words are there, they are often enigmatic. But, as April
DeConick, a professor of Biblical studies at Rice University, pointed out in the Times in 2007,
there was a troubling consistency to a number of the mistranslations in the first edition: they
improved Judas’s image. If the gospel was truly the earth-shaking document that the National
Geographic Society claimed it was—if it promoted Judas from villain to hero—then to have him
denied admission to Heaven would be decidedly awkward.

Other scholars have solved the nosalvation problem—Judas’s and ours—in other ways. In
“Reading Judas: The Gospel of Judas and the Shaping of Christianity” (2007), Elaine Pagels and
Karen L. King, two prominent scholars of Gnosticism, refuse to believe that Judas is not going to
be rewarded for his services to Christ. In a retranslation of the Judas gospel, by King, that they
append to their book, Judas is told that he’s going to Heaven, and that’s that. There is not even a
note to explain this departure from the revised National Geographic translation, which, as the
authors acknowledge, they saw prior to its publication.

“The Lost Gospel of Judas Iscariot: A New Look at Betrayer and Betrayed” (2006), by Bart D.
Ehrman, a professor of religious studies at the University of North Carolina, came out too early to
have to deal with the National Geographic team’s second thoughts, but Ehrman, in his writings on
the gospel, obviously did worry about the statement that just about nobody would be saved. He
claims it’s not true that Jesus said that; then he says it’s true; then he says it’s not true—all on a
single page. But never mind, he concludes: “Some of us have a spark of the divine within, and
when we die, we will burst forth from the prisons of our bodies and return to our heavenly home .
. . to live glorious and exalted lives forever.” I like that quiet “some.” Maybe not most of us, maybe
not you or me, but some of us.

Cumulatively, the commentaries on the Judas gospel are amazing in their insistence on its upbeat
character. Jesus ridicules his disciples, denounces the world, and says that most of us will pass
away into nothingness. Hearing this, Judas asks why he and his like were born—a good question.
Jesus evades it. The fact that liberal theologians have managed to find hope in all this is an

72
indication of how desperately, in the face of the evangelical movement, they are looking for some
crack in the wall of doctrinaire Christianity—some area of surprise, uncertainty, that might then
lead to thought.

The supposedly good new Judas of the Codex Tchacos of course reawakened interest in the bad
old Judas of the Bible. Was he really a villain, or just a scapegoat? Susan Gubar, a professor of
English at Indiana University, has labored for years in the service of historical justice. With Sandra
M. Gilbert, she wrote “The Madwoman in the Attic” (1979) and the three-volume “No Man’s
Land” (1989-94), basic sourcebooks for those who, in the nineteen-eighties and nineties, were
trying to put together a history of women writers omitted from the Anglo-American canon. Since
that time, she has written on the literature of the Holocaust and of American racism. Now she has
produced “Judas: A Biography” (Norton; $27.95). Refreshingly, the book takes a cold view of the
Gospel of Judas. Why all this fuss, Gubar asks, about a positive representation of Judas? There
have been many such representations of him, she says, together with negative ones. That winding
history is the subject of her book.

In the beginning, Judas had no defenders: as Gubar sees it, each successive Evangelist makes him
look worse. By the time of John, in the final Gospel, he is called the Son of Perdition, the same
words that Paul had used to describe the Antichrist. Also, John adds what will become a crucial
detail: Judas’s professional connection with money. He keeps the “common purse”—the small
fund that Jesus and the disciples used for their ministry—and he pilfers from it.

It wasn’t just Judas who was being condemned here. Jesus and all his disciples were Jewish, and
they saw themselves as faithful Jews. If they disagreed with the priests of the Temple on certain
matters—notably, their belief that Jesus was the Messiah—so did many other Jewish sects of the
time. The Christian Jews held to their Jewishness for decades after Christ’s death. Then a change
occurred. For a century after the Roman invasion of Judea, in 63 B.C., many Jews believed that
this was only a temporary affront. They mounted rebellions against Roman rule, but when the
fiercest of these, the Great Jewish Revolt (66-73 A.D.), resulted in a total rout of the Jews, and in
the burning of Jerusalem’s Second Temple—which was not only the headquarters of the Jewish
religion but also the seat of the Jews’ law courts and the repository of their literature—the people
lost heart, and the followers of Christ began to feel that it would be prudent to make friends with
the Romans, by disassociating themselves from the Jews. Furthermore, most of their converts were
coming from among the Gentiles. Why confuse them by making them think they were joining a
Jewish organization?

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For these reasons, among others, a small, pious Jewish sect began to claim that it was itself a
religion, distinct from—even opposite to—Judaism. Such a decision was, of course, accompanied
by considerable anxiety. How to walk away from one’s origins, one’s mother? One way was to
identify Judaism with a special, external evil, and this is where Judas came in. In early Christian
documents, he is like something out of a monster movie. Here is a portrait of him that has been
attributed to Papias, a second century bishop in Asia Minor:

Judas was a dreadful, walking example of impiety in this world, with his flesh bloated to such an
extent that he could not walk through a space where a wagon could easily pass. . . . His eyelids
were so swollen that it was absolutely impossible for him to see the light and his eyes could not be
seen by a physician, even with the help of a magnifying glass, so far had they sunk from their
outward projection. His private parts were shamefully huge and loathsome to behold and,
transported through them from all parts of his body, pus and worms flooded out together as he
shamefully relieved himself.

Judas’s physical repulsiveness was generalized to the Jews—for who were they, as St. Jerome
said, but “the sons of Judas”?—and so was the love of money that prompted him to betray Jesus.
“Shall I tell you of their plundering, their covetousness, their abandonment of the poor, their thefts,
their cheating in trade?” St. John Chrysostom preached.

In the Renaissance and after, Gubar believes, portrayals of Judas become more secular, and more
nuanced. Some artists, she says, show Judas and Christ as friends, and more. To make this point,
she focusses on two paintings of the Judas kiss, the action by which Judas identified Christ for the
police. In Caravaggio’s “The Taking of Christ” (1602-03), she writes, the subject is not so much
the betrayal of Christ by his disciple but the victimization of both by the state: “We see Jesus as
well as Judas overwhelmed by repressive modes of social control that define both of them as
delinquent, criminal, outcast, anathema to the morally bankrupt but highly effective policing
authority of the civic state.” What is the state enforcing here? She finds an answer in Ludovico
Carracci’s “The Kiss of Judas” (1589-90), a lost painting that survives in a copy by a follower.

74
 The Kiss of Judas, after 1589–90

after Ludovico Carracci, Italian, 1555–1619

She calls this canvas “possibly the most startling recreation of the Passion scene,” and it is indeed
a surprise: a frankly erotic portrayal, with Jesus, in an off-the-shoulder robe, looking beautiful and
dazed as Judas embraces him. The picture sends Gubar into an erotic reverie: “It is Judas’s right
hand that gives the picture its extraordinary poignancy, for the fingers hold Jesus’ neck with
delicacy, the brush of Judas’s fingertips barely touching Jesus’ skin. . . . I linger on the glamorous
lassitude of the ephebe or androgyne and his rapt mate.” Jesus and Judas are “enraptured by distinct
visions of excess,” she says. In other words, they are having sexual fantasies about each other.
Given this, the arrest becomes an act of homophobia.

In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, Gubar writes, Judas was revised according to the
leading political passion of the day. He becomes a revolutionary, bent on throwing the Romans
out of Judea. This Judas believed that Jesus had the same intention; that’s why he joined up with
him. Then he had to listen to a lot of sermons about love and turning the other cheek. In this
reading, Judas betrays Jesus in order to force his hand, get him to launch the revolution. That

75
scenario has been popular with twentieth-century filmmakers, including Martin Scorsese, in “The
Last Temptation of Christ” (1988), based on Nikos Kazantzakis’s novel.

In the twentieth century, it does not need to be said, anti-Semitism achieved a climax. Some
historians have claimed that the image of Judas in the European mind was central to the Nazis’
decision to exterminate the Jews—that he was, in Gubar’s words, the “muse of the Holocaust.”
The Nazis did stress Judas’s Judaism, and tried to forget Christ’s. In 1899, Houston Stewart
Chamberlain, an English writer who eventually married one of Wagner’s daughters and took
German citizenship, published a book claiming that Jesus was not Jewish. Galilee, Chamberlain
wrote, was inhabited in ancient times by heathen tribes, and Jesus was descended from them.
German theologians took to making the same argument, and this made it easier to kill Jews. Gubar
believes that the image of Judas as a man who would do anything for money lurks behind Nazi
propaganda films, above all the popular “Jew Süss” (1940), a tale of the eighteenth-century
German Jewish banker Joseph Süss Oppenheimer, who gained control of the finances of the duchy
of Württemberg—the movie shows him leering, pop-eyed, as he pours coins out of a money bag—
and was later hanged. This film was screened for the S.S. and for the citizens of occupied towns
before special “actions” against the Jews.

By the same token, postwar recoil from anti-Semitism (and, no doubt, the widespread
abandonment of faith in the twentieth century) was good for Judas’s reputation. Several
distinguished writers—Kazantzakis, Jorge Luis Borges, José Saramago—present him, or seem to,
either as a hero, of the resistance-fighter sort, or as a suffering witness. In Mikhail Bulgakov’s
“The Master & Margarita” (1966-67), written before the Second World War, Judas is just a young
man, who, after receiving his pay from the Temple, goes off, in sandals so new that they squeak,
to rendezvous with a woman. Meanwhile, Pontius Pilate, pained that he washed his hands of Jesus
and wanting to punish someone for this, mobilizes his secret police, who get Judas’s lady to lead
them to him. They butcher him. Significantly, this happens in the Garden of Gethsemane, where
Judas turned Jesus over to the authorities. As the episode ends, Judas’s body lies forsaken in the
dirt, but a ray of moonlight shines on one of the dearly bought sandals “so that each thong. . . was
clearly visible. The garden thundered with nightingale song”—a scene both poignant and dry.

Between the mid-twentieth century and the present, Gubar’s effort to make sense of the history of
Judas representations breaks down, because the evidence is too sparse, and too ambiguous, in the
modern manner. But the book hits trouble long before it arrives at the modern period, and I think
this is because it is essentially an amateur enterprise. Gubar is a literary scholar. Judas is far less
important in literature than he is in the visual arts and, needless to say, theology. Again and again,

76
Gubar fails to see her evidence in its proper context. Renaissance artists, she says, turned away
from the “earlier stylized portrayals” of the Judas kiss, and began producing more realistic
representations, with closeups and facial expressions. That would be an interesting fact about
Renaissance paintings of Judas if it were not true of all Renaissance paintings. Likewise with the
hints of homophilic feeling that she sees in Caravaggio’s “The Taking of Christ.” To Gubar, this
means that, by the sixteenth century, Judas is being reconceived as Christ’s equal, his lover. But it
may mean little more than that the painting is by Caravaggio. Hints, and more than hints, of
homosexuality appear in a large number of his paintings. That’s why many scholars believe that
he was homosexual—a fact unmentioned in Gubar’s book.

The more Gubar doesn’t know, the bolder she becomes in her interpretations. Looking at Giotto’s
“Betrayal of Christ” (circa 1305), probably the most famous painting of the Judas kiss, she decides
that this Judas is overweight—a telling fact, she believes. “The plump face of Judas, as well as his
corpulent frame beneath the enveloping robe, warns that the kiss might be an incorporating bite.”
It’s not enough that he betrays Jesus; he wants to eat him. Neo-Freudianism is what pushes Gubar
down that rabbit hole, but normally the source of her caprices is just postmodern politics:

A male Eve, Judas—rejecting or accepting, promoting or curtailing Jesus’ potency—inhabits a

decidedly queer place in the Western imaginary. To the extent that Judas stands for the poser or
passer—a person who is not what he seems to be—he reflects anxieties about all sorts of banned
or ostracized groups, not just Jews. An apostle in an all-male circle, associated with anality and
with the disclosure of secrets, Judas retains his masculinity. . . . At other times and in diverse
contexts, though, Judas represents a range of quite various and variously stigmatized
populations—criminals, heretics, foreigners, Africans, dissidents, the disabled, the suicidal, the
insane, the incurably ill, the agnostic. Members of these groups, too, have been faulted for posing
or passing as (alien) insiders. Potentially convertible, all such outcasts might be thought to be using
camouflaging techniques to infiltrate, hide out, assimilate, and thereby turn a treacherous trick.

This is shocking nonsense—argument by incantation—but its import is clear: Judas

represents all the oppressed, and Gubar is there to defend them.

Yet it is Gubar who raises a crucial question unasked in most of the recent writings on Judas: Why
shouldn’t we entertain the idea of an archetypal betrayer? In Gubar’s view, the original, Biblical
Judas may have had a bad influence on our politics, but he does represent something true about
our lives. He testifies, she says, to the “distressing nature of the human condition,” our “capacity
for faltering and sinning” and then for despair and self-hatred—which, somehow, don’t prevent us

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from faltering and sinning again. Many of us, on many occasions, are not going to love one another.
If this widely acknowledged fact is personified by one figure in the New Testament, why shouldn’t
it be?

The alternative is to revise the Bible. Some religious scholars think that this is a good idea. Regina
M. Schwartz, in her book “The Curse of Cain: The Violent Legacy of Monotheism” (1997), argues
that the Old Testament’s endorsement of violence—the fruit, she says, of monotheism, with its
intolerance—has been so destructive that we should delete it from the text and “produce an
alternative Bible . . . embracing multiplicity instead of monotheism.” The religious scholar Willis
Barnstone’s “The Restored New Testament,” which will be published in the fall, includes not only
the canonical Gospels but also three Gnostic gospels: those of Thomas and Mary Magdalene, from
Nag Hammadi, and the Gospel of Judas. But, if we’re going to start rewriting the Bible, where will
that end? What is the Old Testament except a story about monotheism? And what is the Passion
without a sinner to set it in motion? Was Jesus crucified by people who were being good? And, if
Judas is let off the hook, surely we have to reconsider the guilt of the Roman soldiers—not to
speak of the mob, for they were Jews, surely a group deserving special consideration here.

All this, I believe, is a reaction to the rise of fundamentalism—the idea, Christian and otherwise,
that every word of a religion’s founding document should be taken literally. This is a childish
notion, and so is the belief that we can combat it by correcting our holy books. Those books, to
begin with, are so old that we barely understand what their authors meant. Furthermore, because
of their multiple authorship, they are always internally inconsistent. Finally, even the
fundamentalists don’t really take them literally. People interpret, and cheat. The answer is not to
fix the Bible but to fix ourselves.

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Carol A. Hebron writes:25

Fascination with Judas Iscariot was so widespread that even accounts of his childhood began to
appear. A popular work was The Arabic Gospel of the Infancy of the Savior (fifth or sixth century),
which recounted how the young Judas, tormented by Satan, would bite either himself or all who
came near him. This portrayal as “a nasty Satan-inspired, biter of a child” was an interpretation
[15]

of the gospel’s references to the devil’s influence on Judas’ decision to hand Jesus over to the
religious authorities (Luke 22:3; John 13:27). It was a short bow to draw the conclusion that the
devil and Judas were the same!

25
https://www.bloomsburycollections.com/book/judas-iscariot-damned-or-redeemed-a-critical-examination-of-the-portrayal-of-
judas-in-jesus-films-1902-2014/

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Satan and devils were an ever-present part of reality in a way that is difficult for modern
Westernized people to understand. They were depicted by artists as “misshapen, hideous, and
threatening, the embodiment of nightmares and half-expressed fears.” The representation of Jews
[16]

and Judas as “tools of Satan” deepened Christian hatred and added to the Adversus
[17]

Judaeos catalogue of Jewish faults and crimes.

A Jewish biography of Jesus entitled Toledoth Yeshu (sixth/seventh century) provided an

alternative to the highly negative Christian narratives. Combining material from the Talmud, the
New Testament and pagan folklore, the character of Judah Iskarioto (Judas) has magical powers
similar to those of Yeshu (Jesus). Instead of portraying Judas as a traitor, this fanciful folklore saga
paints him as a formidable “defender of Jewish monotheism against Jesus’ new idolatry” and [18]

exonerates the Jews from the charge of Christ killers. That this text was written suggests a Jewish
response to their treatment by Christians.

Dominican monk, Jacobus de Voragine, in his The Golden Legend (1265), draws on an earlier
twelfth-century Latin version of a Judas biography, which is essentially identical to Sophocles’
classical story Oedipus. Jacobus parallels the Judas story to events in the life of the Old Testament
characters Adam, Cain, Moses and Joseph. This legend became the foundation of many Passion
plays of the Middle Ages and of religious poems 8of latter times. The popularity of The Golden
Legend was in the portrayal of Judas as “rotten to the core, from the very beginning and in every
way: fratricide, patricide, incestuous thief and Christ-killer. Christian readers would understand
full well the subject: this is Judas, the proto-typical Jew.” The suggestion that Judas was
[19]

representative of Jews and Judaism was promoted in numerous types of religious dramas.

Mystery, Miracle and Passion plays were meant to entertain while also providing biblical and
theological teaching. The dramatic performances of the Passion narrative also provided an
opportunity to teach the audiences to hate the Jews. From the early tenth century, para-liturgies
commemorating the feasts of the year were developed and presented in dramatic form on the town
streets. Judas was portrayed as the stereotypical Jewish villain: his role defined by both his actions
and his speech. Judas boasts that he is the purser “and whatever was trusted me till, the tenth part
I stole, and would still.” Salacious salutations exaggerate Judas’ hypocrisy. “Hail Master in faith,
[20]

and fellows here. / With great gracious meeting on ground, you are graced. / I would ask you a
kiss, master, and your will were / for all my love and my liking upon you is laid.” [21]

When found guilty of treason, Judas is branded a traitor and is “damned to Hell’s pit [where] / he
shall have no rest, but evermore wake / burning in hot fire, in prison ever shut.” Judas is portrayed
[22]

as the “most gentle of Jewry” and becomes the personification of the Jews who “have intent in
their minds full of malice.” This identification of Judas with the Jews provided a “single dramatis
[23]

persona who would act as a focus of hate.” [24]

With the removal of the devil characters from the Oberammergau Passion Play in 1811—their
popularity and the crowds’ rowdy responses were seen as debasing to the Easter mystery—the
focus of blame turned to the Jews and Judas. The audience’s hatred was such that they were
despised both on and off stage. Saul Friedman cites examples of how the actors portraying Jews
were treated by visiting spectators. In 1900, two

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9English women refused to lodge in the home of Andreas Lang whose character was known as
simply “Rabbi.” The character of Judas was particularly maligned. It is difficult today to imagine
[25]

an actor being persecuted for playing the role of Judas but this happened to Gregor Lechner.
Following his father, Lechner played the role for two decades. However, he refused to pass the
role onto his son, claiming, “I love my child too much to bring the same sufferings upon him which
I and my father before me have been obliged to endure.” [26]

Judas Iscariot has been demonized for a variety of reasons. William Klassen suggests that when
someone deserts a close fellowship “the motives of those who leave are often presented in a hostile
light as others seek to interpret the reasons for their departure.” Judas also fulfils the need for a
[27]

foil, contrasting evil with good. Moreover, there is the innate need to blame someone and Judas is
the obvious target as Kim Paffenroth explains: “When later story-tellers looked at Judas, they saw
the perfect cipher on which to practice their art, shaping him into the kind of man or monster that
their individual stories needed.” [28]

The importance of Judas as an historical character is not as important as the church’s need to
recount his story. It has been suggested that Judas is a fictitious dimension of the Passion narrative
and was deliberately introduced into the biblical text by early Christian writers. Howard Jacobsen
maintains, “Judas Iscariot appears in [the Christian story] not because there actually was such a
person, but because a person is needed for the story to have maximum psychological and spiritual
impact. Judas is entangled in the Christian story because [he] serve[s] the politics of the Church.” [29]

Hyam Maccoby notes, “The mythic status given to Judas as the betrayer of the god-sacrifice
gives his role an imaginative quality that takes it out of sober history.” He adds, “Once this
mythic aura has been analyzed and removed, it will be possible to ask who Judas actually is.” [30]

10The demonization of Judas and the consequent dehumanization of Jews are the foundation of
anti-Semitism, which for two millennia has permeated political, social and religious structures of
countries worldwide. A major consequence of the demonization stage of anti-Semitism was the
[31]

rise of Christian supersessionist theology, also known as replacement theology.

Christian supersessionism is the belief that the covenant between God and the people of Israel no
longer exists, that Jesus is the new covenant and that Christianity is the “New Israel.” Justin Martyr
(ca. 100–165) is the first writer in the Church to claim that Christians are the “true spiritual Israel”
and have replaced the Jews (Dialogue With Trypho 11). There are three major forms of
supersessionism: (1) punitive supersessionism, (2) economic supersessionism and (3) structural
supersessionism.

Punitive supersessionism argues that Israel’s disobedience and consequent punishment by God is
the prime reason for its displacement as the chosen people of God, as Kendall Soulen explains:
“God abrogates God’s covenant with Israel…on account of Israel’s rejection of Christ and the
Gospel.” An example of this is Martin Luther’s belief that the destruction of Jerusalem was proof
[32]

of God’s permanent rejection of Israel. [33]

Economic supersessionism is the view that “carnal Israel’s history is providentially ordered from
the outset to be taken up into the spiritual church.” Israel is replaced because its role in the history
[34]

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of redemption expired with the coming of Jesus Christ. Even such a liberal theologian as Rudolf
Bultmann argued that the Jewish nation is no longer an “empirical historical entity—it does not
exist as a people requiring institutional ordinance for its organization.” Tom Wright put it more
[35]

simply: “Israel’s purpose had come to its head in Jesus’ work.”

[36]

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 Judas Iscariot and the Myth of Jewish Evil, by Hyam Maccoby
Seldom have scriptural text and social history come together so explosively as in the case of

the New Testament story…

Jon D. Levenson writes:26

Seldom have scriptural text and social history come together so explosively as in the case
of the New Testament story of Judas Iscariot. “[A]s Judas was called a devil and the devil’s
workman,” wrote Pope Gelasius I at the end of the 5th century, “he gives his name to the
whole race.” The race the pope had in mind was, of course, the Jews.

As Hyam Maccoby demonstrates with cogency and lucidity, the growth of the legend of
Judas—and perhaps its inception as well—is inextricably linked to the anti-Semitic
stereotypes that have appeared wherever Christianity has gone. The notion of the Jews as
greedy and miserly, for example, is associated with the “deeply implanted, canonical myth”
that Judas’s motive for betraying Jesus to the authorities was the 30 pieces of silver that they
paid him. The moneybag with which Judas was portrayed in medieval art and the Passion
Plays thus recalls not only the New Testament narrative but also the contemporary Jewish
moneylender, who was often depicted toting the same unsavory item.

Maccoby is at pains to point out, however, that the concept of the Jews as the Judas-people
easily survived the widespread loss of Christian faith after the Enlightenment: “[A]lmost
every national group of Christian background whose aspirations have been disappointed is
ready to blame it on those ‘traitors’ the Jews.” A parade example is the infamous case of
Alfred Dreyfus, a Jewish officer in the French army at the turn of the century who was accused

26
https://www.commentary.org/articles/jon-levenson-2/judas-iscariot-and-the-myth-of-jewish-evil-by-hyam-maccoby/

83
of handing over secrets to the Germans. In anti-Dreyfusard polemics, the equation of Dreyfus
with Judas was common and unsubtle.

Nor has it only been the nationalistic Right that has perpetuated the old Christian
scapegoating. It was the socialist pioneer Charles Fourier who wrote that “[t] he Jew is, so to
speak, a traitor by definition.” As Maccoby observes, the Left’s continuation of the old
Christian demonizing of Jews is found not only in Marx but also in the newer anti-Semitism
of today that equates Zionism with racism and Western imperialism, and the Jews with
capitalism and the exploitation of the third world. Maccoby’s learned survey of the strangely
persistent association of Jews with Judas in modern times leads him to sound a cautionary
note about the hopes usually associated with secularization:

It is just at this point in the development of culture, when a myth is renounced on the conscious
level, that it can take hold even more strongly on the unconscious level.

But tracing the latter-day progress of the Judas story is only one part of Maccoby’s project in
this book. He is also concerned with recovering the “true” Judas from the burgeoning mass
of Christian legend and polemic. Here his speculations, though always suggestive, sometimes
come to resemble a veritable house of cards.

In Maccoby’s historical reconstruction, the New Testament story of Judas Iscariot’s betrayal
of Jesus is itself every bit as much a “myth” as are the traditional anti-Semitic canards about
Jewish evil. The letters of the apostle Paul, which predate the Gospels, show no awareness
whatsoever of the legend of Judas. Indeed, Paul reports that the resurrected Jesus appeared to
the twelve apostles, as if one of them had not already been discredited. From this, Maccoby
concludes—plausibly though conjecturally—that the legend of the betrayal is of post-Pauline
origin. Next he traces the evolution of the Judas story through the canonical Gospels, from

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Mark, the earliest, where no bounty is mentioned, to John, the latest, where the perfidious
disciple has become the keeper of the common purse and an embezzler to boot.

Who, then, was the historical Judas? In brief, Maccoby thinks he was one of Jesus’ brothers,
a Zealot who wanted Jesus to implement immediately the scenario of Jewish nationalistic
revolution implicit in his messianic claims. The last we hear of Judas, as Maccoby
reconstructs him, he is serving as the third bishop of the Jewish Christian community in
Jerusalem.

The extreme insufficiency of evidence (which Maccoby acknowledges) about the historical
Judas makes it unlikely that this or any reconstruction will carry the day. His own is as
unconvincing as it is bold.

And this brings us to a third purpose of Maccoby’s book. More than a discussion of Judas
Iscariot in legend and historical fact, it is a critique of Christianity itself, and an apologetic
for Judaism.

In Maccoby’s interpretation,

This means that if the perfidious Judas had not existed—as Maccoby thinks he did not—the
Christian tradition would have had to invent him—as Maccoby thinks it did. For according to

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Maccoby, Judas plays a central and indispensable role in the mechanism of Christian salvation
as the Pauline doctrine of atonement understands it. Judas Iscariot is the “sacred executioner”
who inspires both hatred and awe because he has performed the great deed that is
simultaneously wicked and salvific.

In Maccoby’s view, Christianity, at least in the Pauline form that dominates the New
Testament, represents a “return of the unconscious,” a revival of prehistoric notions that stand
in striking contrast to “the Hebrew Bible’s civilized and sophisticated stories.” Judaism, he
argues, had long since replaced the idea of sin-offerings effecting vicarious atonement with a
conception of them as gifts presented to God by penitent individuals in recognition of
reconciliation. Similarly, the notion of a deed that is both holy and wicked is, in Maccoby’s
view, utterly non-Jewish, for Judaism “refuses to accept ambivalence in an action” and does
not recognize any “admixture of evil” in positive deeds.

This polarization of Judaism and Christianity in Maccoby’s analysis causes him to miss some
revealing Jewish parallels to the evolving legend of Judas Iscariot. In particular, he has missed
the striking affinities’ of the New Testament material with the biblical and later Jewish story
of Jacob’s son Judah, with his catastrophic proposal to his brothers that they sell Joseph, their
father’s beloved son and their own half-brother, into slavery. In the book of Jubilees, a Jewish
work written about 200 years before the earliest books of the New Testament, the origin of
Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, is attributed to this same sale of Joseph: the young goat
in whose blood Joseph’s brothers dip his coat to simulate his death is associated with a goat
that plays a central role in the ritual of Yom Kippur. Later, in rabbinic literature, this idea of
the sale of Joseph as the archetypical sin requiring expiation in every generation becomes
explicit.

Since “Judas” and “Judah” are the same name, and since Jesus is the son of a man named
Joseph, it is odd that Maccoby did not explore the influence of the evolving Jewish story upon

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the Christian one—doubly odd, since he thinks Judas was actually Jesus’ brother. Had he done
so, he would have found that the notion of a despicable act with positive, indeed salvific,
consequences is not altogether alien to Judaism after all. “You intended me harm,” Joseph
tells his brothers at the end of Genesis, “but God intended it for good, so as to bring about the
present result—the survival of a numerous people.” Without the sale of Joseph (which
substitutes for his brothers’ earlier resolution to murder him), the people of Israel would have
perished in the worldwide famine that, instead, brings them to Egypt for a reencounter with a
Joseph now in the position of a powerful savior. Judah’s evil proposal to sell his little brother
thus saves the life of the entire nation—and yet in post-biblical Judaism it is also and equally
a sin associated with annual rites of expiation and (as in the Legend of the Ten Martyrs) with
the gruesome deaths of innocent, in fact saintly, figures. The analogy with the central
Christian story is patent.

The same penchant for overdrawing the contrast between Judaism and Christianity accounts
for Maccoby’s claim that in the former, only repentance and reparation but not sin-offerings
effect reconciliation with God, whereas the latter represents a reversion to primitive ideas of
vicarious atonement through bloodshed. But the idea that there is no atonement without the
shedding of blood is not only found in the Epistle to the Hebrews; it is also found in the
Talmud, whose views on such matters are often much less rationalistic and humanistic than
Maccoby’s and, not surprisingly, much closer to the New Testament.

Maccoby’s portrayal of Christianity is even less reliable. One must wonder why, if the sacred
executioner is an essential constituent of the Pauline conception of atonement, neither Judas
Iscariot nor the Jews as deicides appear anywhere in the authentic writings of Paul (whose
vehement anti-Judaism actually has a completely different foundation). The emphasis
Maccoby places on Judas can obscure the rather telling fact that 22 of the 27 books of the
New Testament fail to mention him. This is an omission they share with the great creeds of
the early Church, some of which affirm that Jesus suffered or was crucified under the Roman

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prefect Pontius Pilate but none of which, in enumerating the essential Christian beliefs,
mentions the alleged role of Judas or the Jews in Jesus’ execution.

It should also be noted that the pernicious identification of Judas with the Jews, though of
high antiquity in Christian tradition, is not made in the New Testament itself. The legend of
Judas may have had an entirely different motivation from the anti-Semitism for which it later
served as a horrifically effective vehicle.

What, finally, would Maccoby do about the prejudice with which the Judas tradition has long
been associated in Western culture? He would have Christians “dismantle the Pauline
Christian myth of atonement” and replace it with a religion in which “Jesus is revered as a
teacher, rather than worshipped as a sacrifice.” This would be, however, a religion without a
scripture, since sacrificial Christology pervades the New Testament—and, anyway, recovery
of the authentic teachings of the historical Jesus is yet another exceedingly speculative
project.

Maccoby’s book fails to reckon adequately with the sincere efforts of many Christians in
recent decades—not only individual theologians and biblicists but also official church
bodies—to heal their tradition of its anti-Semitic disease. To be sure, the disease is as old as
the New Testament itself and has lasted as long as the Christian tradition, a fact that raises
the question of whether these recent efforts represent a permanent cure or only a partial and
temporary remission. Though Hyam Maccoby’s depiction of Christianity is tendentious, his
discussion of the legend of Judas Iscariot in Christian and post-Christian societies is too
accurate to permit an optimistic prognosis.

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