THE PHILOSOPHY

OF THE TALMUD
THE PHILOSOPHY
OF THE TALMUD

Hyam Maccoby
 First published 2002
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For Cynthia
 CONTENTS

Preface and Acknowledgements

1 Does the Talmud contain philosophy?

2 The Aggadah as a source of philosophy
3 The Talmud and moral theory
4 The Rabbinic Social Contract
5 Judaism and Revolution
6 Revolutionary Thought in the Rabbinic Writings
7 The Problem of Morality I
8 The Problem of Morality II
9 Transgressional Sacralism
10 Absolute Values in Talmudic Judaism
11 Political Theory in Torah and Talmud
12 Rabbinic Epistemology
13 The Day God Laughed
14 Talmudic Logic
15 Two Modern Talmudic Thinkers

Appendix A Qal va-chomer in Aggadah

Appendix B Talmudic Rectification of Abuses

References
Index of Quotations
General Index
PREFACE AND ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

To undertake a description of the philosophy of the Talmud may seem to imply too ready
an acceptance of the view that the Talmud can be regarded as a unitary literature. The
word ‘Talmud’, of course, is here being used, as so often, in a rather loose sense, to
mean the rabbinic literature, both Tannaitic and Amoraic, and it includes not only the
two Talmudim (Palestinian and Babylonian), but also works as diverse as the Mishnah,
the Tosefta, the Halakhic Midrashim, the Targumim, the Homiletic Midrashim, the
Liturgy and even the mystical Heikhalot literature, all of which feed into the Talmudim.
Many scholars would see these works as expressing a number of different ‘Judaisms’.
My own view is that, while many distinctions and acknowledgments of development and
change need to be made (and I hope I have always borne this in mind), there is an
underlying unity in the whole corpus, arising from the community of scholarship and
thought that it represents. I have made use here of an analogy between the activity of
the rabbis and that of the enterprise of modern science. Both enterprises involve the
rejection of charismatic authority and the substitution of the co-operation of qualified
individuals, all subscribing to a common intellectual ethos, but infinitely tolerant of
idiosyncrasy and originality, and capable of unexpected development.
I wrote in the Introduction to my Early Rabbinic Writings (Cambridge University
Press, 1988): ‘It is characteristic of this literature that it is presented as the work of an
anonymous compiler, bringing together the views of a large number of named rabbis,
sometimes reinforcing each other, but more often conflicting without rancour. The total
impression is of a corporate literary effort, in which a large number of experts,
belonging to successive generations, is engaged in a common enterprise, the
clarification of Scripture and the application of it to everyday life. To find a similar type
of literary activity in other cultures is not easy. The work of the Alexandrian scholars on
Homer and other Greek classical writers is similar in some ways, but very different in
others. The nearest analogy is probably the organization of scientific research in modern
times: the feeling of comradeship in an an enterprise of great theoretical and practical
significance; the background of agreed assumptions, combined with great freedom for
difference of opinion among qualified researchers; the submission of views to the
criticism of the general body of experts; the acquisition of fame and reputation for
individuals, but only within a framework of shared effort, so that no individual can
become dominant, or acquire a kind of authority different in kind from that of his
fellows.’
In the present book, I have developed further the above analogy between rabbinic and
scientific thought, as one strand in an approach to an appreciation of Talmudic
philosophy. Meanwhile, a similar insight has been developed by Menachem Fisch, in his
excellent work Rational Rabbis (Indiana University Press, 1997), to which I have
referred a number of times (not always in agreement, yet always with a sense of
appreciation of his expertise in both Talmudic studies and in the philosophy of science).
Two books to which I owe a particular debt are Michael Walzer's Exodus and
Revolution (1985) and Stuart Cohen's The Three Crowns (1990). Again, I have not
always agreed with these authors, but have found their basic insights most helpful and
suggestive.
I must express my thanks to Dr. Oliver Leaman, who first encouraged me to embark on
the work. Jonathan Price, too, of the Curzon Press has been most understanding and
helpful.
My former colleagues and students of the Leo Baeck College, London gave me many
opportunities to deepen my understanding of the Talmud in teaching and in discussion.
Since my move to the University of Leeds, I have had further such opportunities as
Research Professor at the Centre for Jewish Studies, and must particularly thank my
colleagues, Dr. Eva Frojmovic and Professor Griselda Pollock for their help and many
kindnesses.
 Most of all, I must thank my dear wife Cynthia, whose support, constructive criticism,
and overcoming of all difficulties made it possible to complete the book.
 1
DOES THE TALMUD CONTAIN
PHILOSOPHY?

The philosophical stance, as traditionally understood, is one of facing the universe

without preconceptions. The philosopher refers to no texts or received doctrines. He
even rejects all knowledge derived from science, at least at his starting-point, though his
researches, as he progresses, may, or may not, provide a validation for science. The
archetypal figure of the philosopher is Descartes, seeking to find the starting point of
philosophy by stripping away everything that could possibly be doubted. But Descartes
is the heir of the Greek tradition of philosophy, in which the philosopher is an
instrument of pure perception turned on the world, which he examines from scratch,
rejecting all received notions as hindrances to his quest. Just because philosophy
emanated from the lone philosopher contemplating the universe without intermediaries,
the focus of enquiry soon became one of epistemology: how reliable was the instrument,
the philosopher himself? This is not a turning away from the world to the contemplation
of the self but a critique of the self as measuring instrument or point of vantage for the
contemplation of the world. He must strip away the fallible senses and find some mode
of enquiry that gives undoubted truth; mathematics, perhaps. But wherein lies the the
authority of mathematics? Does it all reduce to logic? But is not logic mere tautology?
Does the sum of all human enquiry reduce to the proposition ‘A is A’? All this is very
remote from the atmosphere of the rabbinic writings where instead of the lone
philosopher, we have a crowded world.
Again, the process of philosophy, as generally understood, is one of ever-increasing
abstraction. The real world, as the Greek atomists understood it, contained no colours,
smells or sounds; only a concourse of tiny atoms, which by their combinations and
divisions produced the illusion of the colourful, companionable world in which humans
live. Greek philosophy turned into the modern science of physics, which contains
entities even more remote from human concerns.
On the other hand, this process of abstraction, useful as it has been to science, has
met with objections from philosophers who do not want to give up the colourful world as
mere illusion. Even within the school of empiricism, a trend of phenomenalism
developed, in which the realities were the colours, and the atoms were mere
‘constructs’. ‘There is no such thing as a millionth of an inch,’ said Berkeley manfully,
and he was echoed by the physicist Ernst Mach, who denied the existence of atoms. (But
phenomenalism again did not lead to the contemplation of the self, but rather to its
disintegration as the merely notional locus of sensa, which took the place of atoms as
the only real existents.) On the humanistic, literary side, a school of philosophers arose
who questioned the abstractionist search for underlying ‘essences’ and affirmed instead
what actually and palpably exists, more especially the self.
In recent times, philosophy has taken a turn that is more favourable to the view that
rabbinic thought can be described as philosophy. Susan Handelmann has shown the
affinity of the thought of the rabbis to that of the modern Jewish thinkers Bergson,
Husserl, Derrida and Levinas; the latter indeed has acknowledged his debt to the
Talmud. Jacob Neusner, in his way, has characterized the Mishnah as philosophical, but
the resultant philosophy, as he describes it, seems to me very unrabbinic. Earlier, Max
Kadushin had given an overview of rabbinic thought, showing it to be at least semi-
philosophical in its distillation of ‘concepts’ from the biblical material; a long step
towards generalization and abstraction and system, though still at the level of ‘tribal’
theorizing.
Certainly we have to admit that the rabbinic philosophy lacks an overt system. There
are no rabbinic philosophical treatises, unless the tractate Avot can be reckoned as one.
This is really a ‘wisdom’ work, consisting of aphorisms, some of them of a philosophical
kind, and almost all having philosophical repercussions, but not built into a systematic
treatment beginning with first principles and progressing in a logical sequence. But how
far is such a system a requirement for the definition of philosophy? We do not deny the
title of philosopher to those Greek thinkers (such as Heraclitus and Protagoras) whose
thought has descended to us only the form of aphoristic fragments or verses (such as
‘Man is the measure of all things’ or ‘We never step into the same river twice’). Even
Plato is hardly a systematist, and preferred to put his thought into literary, rather than
scientific, form. Modern thinkers who have expressed themselves in non-systematic
ways (Nietzsche, Schopenhauer, Kierkegaard) have been accepted as philosophers.
Even the fact that the thought of the rabbis took off from a text regarded as holy does
not disqualify them from philosophical status if one takes into account the status of
‘text’ in modern philosophical thought as the indispensable ground of all thinking. Even
in Greek thinking, as has been recognised recently, the role of exegesis of Homer as the
stimulus of philosophical endeavour was indispensable1.
However, it is not even quite true that all rabbinic thought is text-based. When the two
schools, the House of Hillel and the House of Shammai met once for prolonged
discussion, their topic was the question, ‘Was it better for man to have been born, or not
to have been born?’ (b. Eruvin 13b). This is undoubtedly a philosophical question,
though not one found in the pre-modernist Western repertoire (concentrating as it does
on what is ‘out there’). After two-and-a-half years (!) of debate, the matter was put to the
vote, and the majority decision was, ‘It would have been better for man not to have been
born, but now that he is born, let him look to his deeds.’ This decision is stunningly
independent of conventional understanding of the Jewish religion. Judaism is usually
regarded as an optimistic faith, with an attitude of thankfulness for the mercies of God.
Most rabbinic thinking turns its face away resolutely from negative assessments of the
conditions of human and animal life. For example, the Grace after meals (a rabbinic
composition) praises God ‘who feeds the whole world … gives food to all flesh, for his
mercy is eternal’, no mention being made of the fact that God's merciful provision of
food so often entails one animal acting as food for another. Yet the mask of rabbinic
acquiescence is occasionally torn away, and we see the world as it is, a scene of ‘Nature
red in tooth and claw’. Rabbinic optimism, humanism and rationalism appear not as
sentimentalism but as a brave challenge issued against a cruel and irrational world.
After the liturgical thankfulness for the chosenness of Israel and the blessed vision of
Mount Sinai, the final sobering conclusion is ‘It would have been better for man not to
have been born’.
We do not have a record, unfortunately, of the arguments that were presented at that
debate, though echoes of them, perhaps, are to be found scattered in the rabbinic
writings. It has been plausibly doubted whether the debate ever actually took place, for
the other recorded debates of the schools of Hillel and Shammai are all on halakhic
topics, where a decision by majority vote makes sense as the mode of fashioning a
working rule. Did the Houses actually spend ‘two and a half years’ debating a
theoretical topic that had no relevance to halakhah? Or is this story merely an echo of
the philosophical or rhetorical exercises characteristic of Hellenistic sophists?2 I
suggest, however, that the debate did take place, and that it had a meta-halakhic
function. After all the halakhic arguments, in which the rabbinic intellect took such
delight, the nagging thought could not be quite stilled, ‘Is this all pointless escapism
from an inexorably indifferent universe?’
It may be that in addition to empirical arguments from the conditions of human life,
recourse was had, after all, to certain biblical texts which face the world in a stark,
extra-covenantal fashion, namely the books of Job and Ecclesiastes (Qohelet). It is
remarkable that these two books were included in the canon, for neither of them has
much to say about the characteristic themes of Judaism. In one we have a non-Jew, Job
the Uzzite, facing a world without Torah or chosenness or covenant, and finding himself
overwhelmed with unintelligible suffering. In the other, we have a Jewish king, at the
apex of the covenant in Jerusalem, whose main topic is the meaninglessness of human
aspirations. He does, in the end, find some solace in the covenant, but only as a refuge
from the overwhelming ‘vanity’ of human concerns.
Even at the heart of the covenant, in God's dealings with Abraham, there is a
terrifying vacuum. Abraham has become ‘the friend of God’ and has reached such a
pitch of intimacy with God that he can plead with Him to spare the Sodomites, and even
upbraid Him for His lack of elementary fairness and compassion: ‘Shall not the Judge of
all the earth do justice?’ (Genesis 18:25). Yet in the next chapter, everything suddenly
changes. God demands the life of Abraham's beloved son, and Abraham has run out of
objections; he acquiesces in a spirit of total submission, for the transaction is extra-
covenantal, an assertion of God's unbridled will. The uncovenantal God rides roughshod
over the promises of the covenantal God. The contradiction emphasizes that the
covenant exists as an oasis in a frightening, unintelligible world. God is a ‘friend’ within
the covenant, but outside it He is unsusceptible to human codes of morality. The
covenant is a way of taming God. He voluntarily commits Himself to it, as a matter of
‘grace’, but it is not a true reflection of the universe, which may at times assert itself in
all its horror. Judaism is a religion of covenant, but the obverse of this is a very stark
vision of uncovenanted existence.
Thus we may conclude that rabbinic philosophy is equivocal and paradoxical, derived
as it is from an equivocal and paradoxical Scripture.
But can we really speak of rabbinic philosophy when the rabbis have actually placed a
ban on philosophical thinking? We read in the Mishnah:
The forbidden degrees [of sexual relationships] may not be expounded before three persons, nor the Story of the
Creation before two, nor the chapter of the Chariot before one alone unless he is a Sage that understands of his
own knowledge. Whosoever gives his mind to four things it were better for him if he had not come into the world
— what is above? what is beneath? what was beforetime? and what will be hereafter? And whosoever takes no
thought for the honour of his Maker, it were better for him if he had not come into the world.
(M. Hagigah 2:1, Danby's translation).

The passage forbids free and open discussion of sexual and mystical\philosophical
matters, restricting such discussion to small groups. The two great topics of mysticism
were Creation and Chariot, i.e. deep contemplation of the first chapter of Genesis and
the first chapter of Ezekiel, and these two chapters, one might think, do engage in the
very topics that the passage goes on to interdict: what is above, what is beneath, what
was beforetime, what will be hereafter. But if these topics may be contemplated in small
groups, though not in larger ones, why are they then totally condemned? Why would it
be better for those who contemplate them not to have come into the world? Does this
mean that philosophers and even mystics are condemned to wretchedness and
ostracism?
The forbidden topics are just those that intrigued the pre-Socratic philosophers whose
concern was for the constitution and dimensions of the observable universe and for the
unobservable structures which lay behind or beneath it. Out of these philosophical
concerns arose what came to be known as ‘science’, which hived off from philosophy
when the emphasis came to rest on measurement rather than speculation. So the
Mishnah's condemnation could be held to outlaw science as well as philosophy and
mysticism. Modern science has focussed on the history of the universe over billions of
years (‘what is before and after’, though some translate these words of the Mishnah in a
spatial sense) and the dimensions of the universe over billions of miles. Does the
Mishnah condemn Einstein, astronomy, and space exploration? Yet rabbinic mysticism,
with its heroes travelling through all the heavens to reach the throne-room of God (in
the heikhalot literature) could be be held to comprise the first imaginative experiments
in space travel.
Clearly the Mishnah passage requires exegesis in terms other than mere
condemnation of all thought rising above terrestrial experience. Such a plain
interpretation would condemn many daring thoughts found in the rabbinic literature
itself, including the Talmudic expositions of this very mishnaic passage. The well-known
Midrashic speculation about what God was doing before he created the present world
(‘He was creating other worlds and destroying them’, Genesis Rabbah III.7) would have
to be condemned as a heretical, unlicenced exercise of the human intellect.
 Again, what is the force of saying that the philosophical speculator would have been
better off if he had not been born? Is this a threat of punishment, or is it a prediction of
the psychological misery that will afflict the person who allows himself to sink into a
morass of thought on matters beyond human comprehension (the condition of
intellectual dislocation caused by philosophical reflection for which Hume prescribed
backgammon)? And if the decision of the debate between the Houses is to be given
weight (that it would have been better for all mankind not to have been born), how
would the unfortunate philosopher be worse off than his fellows?
Maimonides, who was not averse to philosophical reflection, and indeed regarded it as
the highest human activity, interpreted this Mishnaic passage as a warning against
intellectual over-ambition. He relates it to the saying : ‘Do not inquire into things that
are too difficult for you, do not search what is hidden from you; study what you are
allowed to study, and do not occupy yourself with mysteries’ (quoted from Ben Sira in b.
Hagigah 13a), and to the biblical saying, “Do not make yourself over-wise; why should
you destroy yourself?’ (Ecclesiastes 7:16). Most people, Maimonides argues, would do
well to leave philosophy alone, since it will reduce them to a state of miserable
confusion; yet philosophy, for him, is the crown of all intellectual endeavour. While these
sayings in Wisdom literature appear to counsel everyone to refrain from philosophical or
mystical enquiry, Maimonides takes them to be addressed to the majority only (Guide, I.
32). There is some support for this interpretation in rabbinic literature, which portrays
certain great persons (Johanan ben Zakkai, Akiva) as versed in mysteries without
coming to harm, while simultaneously issuing warnings about the disasters that can
occur to those (even persons of high attainment such as Elisha ben Avuya, Ben Zoma
and Ben Azzai) who venture beyond their capacity. If the rabbinic warnings seem at
times absolute, this may be because the rabbis were always concerned to advise and
legislate for ordinary rather than for extraordinary people, though they remain fully
capable of admiring the virtuoso.
Certainly the rabbinic writings contain some bold speculations about what is above
and what is below, what was before and what will be after. For example, we have the
following pronouncement by Rabban Johanan ben Zakkai:
From the earth to the firmament is a distance of 500 years' travel, and the thickness of the firmament is a
distance of 500 years' travel, and such is the distance between each of the firmaments. Above them are the Holy
Animals (Ezekiel 1), whose bodies are greater than all the firmaments. Above them, is the Throne of Glory
(b. Hagigah 13a).

This cosmological scenario, though it is intended to discourage would-be astronauts

such as Nimrod, who allegedly planned to reach the Throne and destroy God (a rabbinic
interpretation of Isaiah 14:14, applied in the Pseudepigrapha to the rebellious angel
Satan or Mastema), shows a soaring imagination that belies its dampening intent. It
recalls Neo-Platonic cosmological schemata, which eventually found Jewish expression
in the medieval Kabbalah, with its vast universe of progressively condensing
emanations. At the same time, this saying of Johanan ben Zakkai, with its panorama of
huge distances, recalls the strange imaginings of the Shiur Qoma, the rabbinic work
that gives dizzying statistics of the dimensions of God Himself.
I would suggest, however, contrary to Maimonides, that the ban on contemplation of
what is above and below, before and after, is addressed not to ordinary people, but to
the mystics themselves. The key word in the ban is ha-mistakel, ‘he who gazes’. Danby
translates this as ‘he who gives his mind to’, but this is far too colourless a rendering.
From mystical passages in the Talmud, we see that one of the dangers of the mystical
ascent to the Throne was the temptation to ‘gaze’. Even though the whole aim of the
ascent is to see the supernal mysteries, there is a right and a wrong way to look at them.
An irreverent, immature, overcurious, voyeuristic type of looking can bring disaster to
the mystic (see b. Sanhedrin 92a, ‘he who gazes on nakedness’). This is what is meant
by ‘taking no thought for the honour of one's Maker’; the vision of God is not to be
turned into a peepshow. The companions of Akiva in the heavenly ascent, made the
mistake of ‘peeping’, though here the verb heitzitz is used in preference to histakel.
The ban on ‘gazing’ is thus not a ban on thought, but a warning against undertaking
the mystical ascent (which can equally be called a ‘descent’) without full psychological
preparation. The Mishnaic passage, therefore, cannot validly be cited as a ban on
philosophical or scientific investigation, which indeed many other rabbinical passages
encourage, as the history of post-Talmudic philosophy and science amply demonstrates.
Shall we then include rabbinic mysticism, with its cosmological speculation, in our
definition of rabbinic philosophy? A case could be made out for doing so. The cosmology
of Neo-Platonism (Plotinus) is generally included in the history of philosophy. Even if
such wild guesses at the constitution of the universe are not based on scientific
experiment or even on logical analysis, they form part of the process of ordered thinking
about the universe; Karl Popper has taught us to respect the initial role of guesswork in
all thinking. When Thales made the first guess at the basis of material substance, he was
wildly wrong, but he started a process of thought that developed eventually into
atomism, and Thales is regarded as the father of Western philosophy.
Yet it can equally be argued that Thales was not a philosopher at all but a (would-be)
scientist. The more his type of thinking progresses, the more it is revealed as not
philosophy but science. Plato realised this when he portrayed Socrates as turning away
from the pre-Socratic thinkers and turning his attention from the universe to Man. This,
according to Nietzsche, was a sad fall from grace, since the pre-Socratics were
unafflicted by self-doubt and turned their gaze so boldly and heroically outwards. But in
other respects, Nietzsche was himself influential in a reinstatement of Man rather than
the Universe as the subject-matter of philosophy, and the abandonment of the attempt to
make philosophy into a branch of science, or to formulate its findings in scientific form.
The philosophy of the Talmud is undoubtedly a contribution to the understanding of
Man, and especially man-in-society. Occasional excursions into exploration of the
universe are peripheral, metaphorical and hyperbolical. Did Johanan really believe that
the distance to the first firmament was precisely 500 years of travel? What mode of
travel did he envisage? How did he propose to verify his statement? The Talmud does
not really take itself seriously, in a factual way, in this kind of venture. Johanan's main
point was a moral one: to emphasise the crassness of a man setting himself up against
God. Similarly, in the Shiur Qomah, the enormous distances described (far more
extravagant than Johanan's) lead in the end to the annihilation of distance as a concept
relevant to the description of God, while instilling some sense of the infinitesimal
tininess of man in relation to an infinite universe. Such speculation does, however, make
a serious philosophical point in that the cosmic insignificance of Man acts as
counterpoint or dialectical contrast to the general rabbinic humanistic concept of Man
as the centre of the universe, for the sake of whom the whole universe was created.
There is no word in Hebrew that corresponds exactly to the Greek words ‘philosophy’
or ‘philosopher’. Yet one Greek philosopher (Theophrastus) described the Jews as ‘a
nation of philosophers’, which suggests that he saw the nation as a whole as dedicated
to intellectual tasks which in Greek civilization were confined to a very small minority.
Particularly surprising was the conduct of the Jewish synagogue, in which ordinary
people met not to perform sacrifices, as in the Greek temples, but to listen to learned
discourses and study sacred writings. To the Greeks, or some of them, the rabbis
themselves seemed to be philosophers in a fuller sense, since they dispensed moral
advice and accumulated disciples just like the Stoic and Cynic philosophers. Indeed, the
question has been raised how far the rabbinic movement was influenced by the Greek
philosophical movements. There are obvious similarities and echoes: for example, the
Golden Rule, both in its negative rabbinic form ‘Do not unto others what you would not
want them to do unto you’ (Hillel) and its positive form ‘Do unto others what you would
want them to do unto you’ (Jesus) is found attributed to many Hellenistic sages. We
should remember that the Hellenistic philosophers should not be conceived entirely in
the image of lofty thinkers such as Socrates, Plato and Aristotle, but also as performing
a humbler social role as guides to popular circles.
The Greek word ‘philosopher’ itself does appear without translation in the rabbinic
writings from time to time, usually designating a non-Jewish intellectual who is curious
or critical about Jewish doctrines. The rabbis were aware of the existence of
philosophers, but preferred for themselves the designations of ‘sages’ or ‘comrades’.
I am not arguing, however, that philosophy exists in the Talmud only in the popular
sense of the term as it applied to many of the Stoic and Cynic philosophers or to the
earlier popular preachers stigmatised by Plato as ‘sophists’. I am arguing that the
Talmud contains philosophy in the highest sense, though not in the form of systematic
treatises, but in a much more diffused and incidental form. It often has to be distilled
from discussion of apparently non-philosophical topics, where the background
assumptions are of a philosophical nature.
The most obvious way in which philosophy appears is in the form of aphorisms. A
famous example is the saying of Rabbi Akiva: ‘All is overseen, but choice is granted’
(Avot 3:15). As Maimonides understands this aphorism, it is a meditation on the subject
of freewill and destiny. If God sees the future, how can there be freewill, since
everything I do is predestined by God's foreknowledge, and my sense of freedom is
illusory? Yet Akiva states that this contradiction is only apparent: God's ability to see
past, present and future simultaneously does not restrict my freedom of choice. Only a
creature living in Time sees a contradiction; the Being who transcends Time transcends
the contradiction.
Some, however, have regarded Maimonides' explanation of Akiva's saying as too
philosophical and paradoxical to be convincing. Obadiah Bertinoro, in his commentary
on the Mishnah, departs from his usual subservience to Maimonides. He gives the
somewhat humdrum interpretation that Akiva was saying, ‘God sees into every heart,
and choice is given.’ In other words, God is aware of all the motives which lead to any
moral decision and action, and accords reward or punishment accordingly. Some
modern commentators, unwilling to assign profundity to a 2nd century rabbi, have found
Bertinoro's interpretation more acceptable. It has at least the merit of providing a
strong link with the continuation: God's judgment is tempered with mercy.
However, there is no need to underrate Akiva's capability for paradox, or his
awareness of a perennial philosophical problem, the conflict between determinism (of
whatever kind) and free will. We know from Josephus that the Pharisees (whom
Josephus calls ‘philosophers’, Ant. XII:289), Akiva's immediate predecessors, were
exercised by this very problem: ‘ … when they determine that all things are done by
fate, they do not take away the freedom from men of acting as they think fit’ (Ant. XVIII.
13). Josephus, of course, has been accused of presenting the Pharisees in over-
philosophical guise in order to make them more intelligible to his readers. This is
probably true, but only in the sense that he omitted aspects of the Pharisees that he
thought his readers would not understand. He certainly would not invent an interest on
the Pharisees' part in the problem of free will.
Assuming that Akiva's remark is indeed a reflection on the paradox of free will, we
may offer the criticism that he draws attention to the problem but does not attempt to
solve it. A true philosopher would be impelled to seek some broader context in which
the contradiction would be dispelled or at least softened; Maimonides, for example, sees
an approach to a solution in the analysis of Time. Nevertheless, even to be aware of the
problem is the mark of a philosopher. Akiva is saying, ‘There are good reasons for
determinism and also good reasons for belief in free will. Do not aim at a superficial
logical consistency by sacrificing either insight, but hold on to them both.’ This implies
some kind of view about the limitations of human reason (giving rise to what Kant called
‘antinomies’) and also about the validity of human reason within those limitations.
More striking and significant, however, are the philosophical insights that arise in
rabbinic literature not from general relaxed reflection on the world but from the heat of
moral and legal concern. These are specifically Jewish contributions to philosophy that
cannot be paralleled in any other literature. An example is the exhortation to a witness
in a murder trial:
How does one cast awe on the witnesses in capital cases? They used to bring them in and cast awe on them as
follows: Perhaps you will speak by guesswork, or by hearsay, or from previous evidence, or on the authority of
someone you consider trustworthy, or perhaps you are unaware that we intend to examine you with searching
enquiry. Know that capital cases are not like non-capital cases. In non-capital cases, a witness may atone by
payment for having given wrong evidence, but in capital cases, a witness is responsible not only for the blood of
the accused,but for the blood of his descendants until the end of the world. For so we have found with Cain, who
killed his brother, that it is written ‘The bloods of thy brother cry from the earth’ (Gen. 4:10). It does not say, ‘The
blood of thy brother’ but ‘The bloods of thy brother’, meaning his blood and the blood of his descendants. For that
reason, man was created as a single individual [from whom all mankind descended], to teach you that Scripture
regards one who destroys a single soul as if he has destroyed a whole world3; and also Scripture regards one who
saves the life of a single soul as if he has saved the life of a whole world. And also [man was created as a single
individual] for the sake of peace among mankind, so that no man may say to his neighbour, ‘My father (abba) was
greater than your father’. And also that heretics should not say ‘There are many powers in heaven’. And also to
proclaim the greatness of the Holy One, blessed be He, for though a human being may stamp many coins with one
 seal, they are all identical, while the King of Kings, the Holy One, blessed by He, has stamped every human being
with the seal of Adam, yet not one of them is like his fellow. Therefore everyone is obliged to say ‘For my sake the
world was created’. And perhaps you [the witnesses] may say ‘Why should we bother with this troublesome
matter?’ But has it not been said (Lev. 5:1), ‘He being a witness, whether he has seen or known, if he does not
utter it, then he shall bear his iniquity’? And perhaps you may say ‘Why should we be responsible for the blood of
this man?’ But has it not been said (Prov. 11:10), ‘When the wicked perish there is rejoicing’?
(Mishnah, Sanhedrin 4:5).

This passage is ostensibly legal, describing the procedure in a court of law, but it is also
sublimely philosophical, comprising a statement of the essence of Judaism. It is in this
indirect way that the philosophy of the Talmud is often conveyed, in the interstices of
legal discussion (halakhah), as well as in the poetic flights of the aggadah.
The counterpoint here is between man as a totality and man as a being-in-society. On
the one hand, each person is a whole world, containing within himself/herself all society;
on the other hand, each person is one individual in a crowded world of individuals, past,
present and future, to whom he is linked by a chain of shared community.
What does it mean to say that each person is a whole world? There is something here
of Leibnitz's concept of monadology, in which each individual reflects the whole universe
from a special point of view. This is an individualism that does not atomize society (like
that of Hobbes and the English school of utilitarianism).
It is also a monism that does not develop into fascism. Judaism does not have a
hierarchy of monads, some reflecting the universe more than others. The murdered
person in the above passage is not prized as someone special, but as a human being,
who is thereby special.
Noteworthy, too, is how rabbinic thought arrives at philosophy through exegesis of the
Torah. Whereas the pre-Socratics sought to emancipate themselves from texts, and
gazed only at the sky and the earth, the Jewish philosophers gazed earnestly into the
text of the Torah and sought to distil a philosophy from it. Yet in their Torah-reading,
they also drew on their community tradition, which was profoundly individualistic and
also communitarian. While apparently subservient to the text, they also created it by
their interpretations, just as the Neoplatonists created an interpretative Homer. There is
nothing inevitable about the anti-racialist and anti-aristocratic conclusions they drew
from the story of the lone creation of Adam. Other conclusions might perhaps have been
drawn by people with a different community history. What they saw in it was a doctrine
of the equality of all peoples, and yet also a doctrine of inalienable difference. Everyone
is the same, yet everyone is different.
Robert Gordis writes on this passage: ‘The implications are clear: man's innate dignity
is the source of his right to be different, which is the essence of freedom. The equality of
men, as seen in their common origin, is the source of all men's right to justice.’4 This
fine formulation is, however, a little over-American. It is not so much a question of the
‘right to be different’, but rather of admiration of God's creative power in making
everyone different. Everyone is a world, but a different world; the universe is a system
of interlocking worlds, each independent, yet all inter-dependent. The community
demands that each individual should feel responsible for every other in a unifying
system of justice and concern for all life. Yet each individual should feel that the
universe was created for his sake alone.
The idea that each person constitutes a whole world is one of those pregnant insights
that generate a whole philosophy. One may ask if there is any kinship between this legal-
context aphorism and the aggadic myth of the primeval Adam. According to this myth,
when Adam was first created, ‘he stretched from one end of the world to the other’5.
When Adam sinned, however, God reduced his stature to that of other earthly animals.
This myth, however, is philosophically much inferior to the legal-context insight. For the
myth seems to say that humanity in its pre-lapsarian state constituted a world; while the
Mishnah says that each person, even with post-lapsarian limitations and tiny dimensions
in the physical universe, is nevertheless an entire world, since he/she reflects the
universe from a unique, unrepeatable standpoint.
Thus halakhic contexts can sometimes be a more satisfying source of rabbinic
philosophy than what might appear the more promising field of aggadic discourse.
1See Lamberton (1989).
2SeeFischel (1973), for similarities between rabbinic sayings and the Cynic and
Epicurean chria. Fischel, however, does not find a parallel for the debate between the
Houses mentioned here.
3Thetranslation ‘Whoever saves one life saves the world entire’ (used as the epigraph of
Steven Spielberg's film ‘Schindler's List’) is not correct. The Hebrew ‘olam mal’e
means not ‘the whole world’ but ‘a whole world’. The difference is profound; one
asserts the kinship of every person with the whole of humanity, but the other asserts
something more, that each person is himself/herself a world.
4Gordis (1976).
5GenesisR. 8:1, b. Hag. 12a. This rabbinic myth should be distinguished from later
medieval theosophical speculations about the Primeval Adam (Adam Kadmon) as an
aspect of God.
 2
THE AGGADAH AS A SOURCE OF
PHILOSOPHY: GOD AS ARTIST

Nevertheless, the Aggadah is after all the chief, or at least the most obvious, source of
rabbinic philosophy, since it arises so immediately out of exegesis of the non-legal or
narrative aspects of Scripture. The Aggadah is a unique genre which is not easily
characterized. The word means ‘story-telling’ and often it partakes of the nature of
myth. It is an essential aspect of rabbinic activity, and yet it does not have the authority
that attaches to halakhah. Each of the rabbis had his aggadic licence, so to speak, and
did not have to consider what other rabbis had to say on the same subject, or submit his
aggadic productions to any tribunal or voting body, as in the case of halakhah. At the
same time, there was such a thing as criticism of aggadah, and this took forms similar to
what we know as literary criticism (an instance is the scornful treatment that Rabbi
Akiva received when he stepped out of his usual halakhic field and attempted to engage
in aggadah, see p. 167).
The aggadah is found scattered throughout the rabbinic literature. This literature is
both early (Tannaitic) (Mishnah, Tosefta, Halakhic Midrashim) and late (Amoraic)
(Talmudim, Homiletic Midrashim), as well as including some unclassifiable material,
such as the Targumim, Seder Olam Rabbah, Shiur Qomah, Megillat Taanit, and, very
important, the rabbinic liturgy. The literature (popularly abbreviated to simply ‘Talmud’)
thus covers a period of over 1000 years, and yet shows a remarkable unity of style and
conceptuality.
Even in the most strictly legal composition, the Mishnah, there are outbreaks of
aggadah, such as the story of Honi the Circlemaker in Taanit (see p. 94), and the
messianic material at the end of Sotah. The two Talmudim take the form of a
commentary on the Mishnah, but this commentary (Gemara) is of a loose kind that can
tolerate infinite digressions, and often interrupts legal discussions with outbursts of
aggadah which may go on for pages. It seems that the rabbinic urge for story-telling is
irrepressible, breaking through the formal bounds of legal decision-making and
continually reducing the impersonal to the personal.
The rabbinic term ‘aggadah’ is an Aramaized form of the Hebrew word ‘haggadah’
which is best known as the title of the text of the Passover Seder service. This is the
fount and origin of the story-telling impulse in rabbinic Judaism. It is a biblical
injunction to tell the story of the Exodus from Egypt on the night of its anniversary,
Passover. Even those who are deeply versed in all aspects of Jewish learning must put
aside their researches and devote themselves to telling the simple story of the liberation
from slavery in Egypt, which is the basis of all Judaism, including its philosophy.
This is why I prefer the term ‘philosophy’ to ‘theology’ in relation to rabbinic thought.
Most studies of the rabbinic aggadah try to distil a ‘theology’ from it, in terms of
metaphysical conceptions of the nature of God. At one time, when philosophy itself was
mainly concerned with metaphysics, or the ultimate nature of reality, this was a valid
approach. Nowadays, however, when philosophy is much more concerned with
phenomenology, the characterization of what it means to be a human individual in the
world, it seems that the term ‘philosophy’ is more appropriate to the discussion of the
thought of rabbinic Judaism, which is always geared to the phenomenology of the
individual-in-society and the conditions of freedom. One may perhaps say that the term
‘Weltanschauung’ is even more appropriate, since it covers non-academic unsystematic
responses to life in general. But the gap between philosophy and ‘Weltanschauung’ has
narrowed as the pretensions of philosophy to professionalism and academicism have
become suspect.
The Exodus story is the real foundation-myth of Judaism, even though the Creation
story of Genesis might seem to be more fundamental. But the Bible shows carefully that
Judaism did not begin with the Creation. The election of Israel took place at a relatively
late stage in history. For the rabbis, therefore, Judaism began at Sinai, over 2000 years
after the Creation. Judaism records the Beginning, but does not claim to have been
there at the beginning. The implications for the status of mankind, and for the Jews
within mankind, are profound.
The rabbinic commentary on the Exodus, at its most focussed, can be found in the
Haggadah, the liturgy of the home ceremony of the Passover. Here the humble, even
ignoble, origins of the Jewish people are stressed.
We were slaves to Pharaoh in Egypt … In early times, our ancestors were idol-worshippers … Of old, your fathers
dwelt beyond the river, Terah the father of Abraham and the father of Nahor, and they worshipped other gods. …
A wandering Aramaean was my father1.

Instead of dwelling on the glorious ancestry of the Israelites, the proud descent from the
patriarchs Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the Haggadah dwells on the earlier descent from
inglorious idolaters, and the later ignominious status as slaves in Egypt. This is in
accordance with the Mishnaic instruction for the conduct of the Seder: ‘He begins with
the disgrace and ends with the glory’ (M. Pesahim 10:4).
This is contrary to the practice of those other cultures that claim ‘chosen’ status. They
claim privileged descent from ancestors dating from the beginning of the world, and
claim also a glorious past of success and achievement. They also claim the inherent
inferiority of other branches of humanity. The Jewish concept of ‘chosenness’ is very
different, and is closely bound up with an anti-racialist and anti-aristocratic view of
humanity as a whole.
As we saw in the last chapter, the rabbis regarded the descent of all mankind from one
man, Adam, as the guarantee of human equality: ‘So that no one could say, “My ancestor
was greater than your ancestor”.’ But do not the Jews take pride in their descent from
Abraham? There seems here a tension, or conflict, between a doctrine of human equality
and a doctrine of chosenness. The Jews have been accused often enough of racialism in
this regard (even by Jewish writers like Arthur Koestler and Dan Jacobson), and even of
having inspired the Nazi belief in the chosenness of the Aryan race. But in fact, the
descent from Abraham is not an occasion for racial or aristocratic pride, but rather is
given as a reason for God's persistence in enduring the inadequacies of his chosen
people. This is the meaning of the rabbinic concept ‘The merit of the Patriarchs’ (zekhut
‘avot)2; a reservoir of merits that could be drawn on when, as so often, the merits of the
Jews themselves were so doubtful that their continued existence was in the balance. The
merits of the Patriarchs were thus regarded not a matter of aristocratic pride, but rather
as a desperate lifeline and resource. In any case, the racial descent from Abraham had
become meaningless, in biological terms, even by the time of the rabbis, since so many
individuals and even whole nations had become converted to Judaism and had mixed
their genes with those of Abrahamic descent.
The descent from Abraham nevertheless did give some validity, in terms of
respectability, to a people who would otherwise have to regard themselves as mere
riffraff. Yet in the Haggadah, even this claim to respectability is abandoned. The descent
from Abraham is not even mentioned, except to point out that Abraham was himself a
descendant of idolaters; it seems that the Abrahamic pride is deliberately stifled. The
aim of this is perhaps to emphasise the magnanimity of God in elevating such a lowly
people to chosen status; but the effect is to emphasize the revolutionary character of the
new upstart religion which, at the Exodus, set itself against the great established
powers and religions of the world. The more ignominious the origin of the Israelites, the
more their new religion shone forth as a new start for mankind, a shattering of privilege,
wealth and power, and a rallying-point for the enslaved and the oppressed.
If the Exodus story is the foundation-myth of Judaism, giving its direction and impulse,
why does it not form the beginning-point of the Hebrew Bible? Why is it preceded by the
history of the previous 2000 years since the Creation of the world, with an account of
events among the nations which transpired before the Israelites came into existence,
including the pre-diluvian generations, and the dispersion of nations after the Flood?
Why not start with Exodus rather than with Genesis? What is the point of this
international setting of the story, and how does the rabbinic aggadah deal with this non-
Jewish background to the late advent of the Jewish religion?
One answer has already been given: in order to bring out the revolutionary character
of the new religion, it was necessary to sketch the world against which it was rebelling.
Contrary to other tribes and other religions, the Israelites did not trace their origin to
the beginning of the world, but portrayed themselves as latecomers and parvenus;
which perhaps explains why so many of their stories concern the triumph of the younger
son.
But there was also another reason: to give a more rounded portrayal of the history of
God. It is in Genesis, and in its rabbinic exegesis, that the more extended philosophy
and cosmology of Judaism is to be found.
Genesis tells us that God created the world, which therefore had a beginning in time,
and did not exist from all eternity. Here at once we have a philosophy of Nature that is
different from that of the Greeks, and also from that of modern science, which derives
from the Greeks. Instead of a book of Nature, whose secrets we must constantly seek to
read, we have a created Heaven and Earth, which do not represent ultimate reality since
their Creator transcends them.
The philosophical conclusion is found in the rabbinic liturgy, in which God is called ‘He
who renews every day continually in his goodness the work of the Beginning’. God not
only created the world but creates it anew every day. Thus the Greek view of the
universe as the background of all being, past, present and future, is denied. There is no
constant inevitable background within which changes takes place but which is itself for
ever unchanging. Everything is being constantly renewed by an outside Force which is
inexhaustible.
This might seem to rule out all scientific enquiry, since it rules out such maxims as the
conservation of matter, or (its later equivalent) the conservation of energy, by which the
universe, despite its continual shifts of energy, remains, in the end, the same
unbeginning and unending universe. But in fact, the concept of a continually renewing
universe, in which no moment is the inevitable outcome of the previous moment, is one
which, in the history of science, has had some notable adherents, including, for example,
the philosophers Hume and Berkeley, who rejected causation as an inherent mechanism.
They saw science as the investigation of recurring phenomena, which recurred without
any inherent causal necessity, but with sufficient regularity to make the formulation of
scientific laws, or at least hypotheses, possible.
In Islamic philosophy of the Middle Ages, there were two schools, one of which
followed Aristotle in seeing the universe as the eternal container of all existents and
events which in principle were all predictable, while the other (the Ash'arites) denied all
fundamental causation and asserted the continual renewal of all things by the will of
God3. The latter school were the precursors of the empiricists Hume and Berkeley,
though they were more like Berkeley in seeing the otherwise inexplicable regular
recurrence of phenomena as deriving from the will of God, who wished his creatures to
have the comfort of living in a world where things happened as expected from previous
experience.
In Jewish medieval philosophy, the conflict of the Islamic schools was reflected in the
conflicting views of Maimonides and Nachmanides. Maimonides was a modified
Aristotelian. Though he deferred to the evidence of Holy Scripture that the universe was
created, not eternal, he considered that the regularity of events was inherent in the
original constitution of the universe, which was like a wound-up clock that could be left
to function without constant attention from its maker. Science, therefore, was the
investigation of God's plan or blueprint for the universe. Nachmanides, however, was an
uncompromising occasionalist, thinking that the observed regularity of events was not
inherent, and that the rising of the sun in the morning was no less an immediate ad hoc
marvel than any deed recorded of the miracle-working prophets. ‘One cannot be said to
profess the faith of Moses unless one believes that all phenomena to which we are
subject are miracles every one, not caused by any natural law’ (Commentary on Torah,
Exodus 13:6).
Maimonides, in support of his view of Nature as a self-functioning construction set in
motion by God, could have pointed to certain aggadic passages in his support4. Certain
Midrashic passages say that God created the universe with the aid of the Torah, which
he had previously created. ‘The Torah preceded the world’ (b. Shabb. 88b).
It is customary that when a human being builds a palace, he does not build it according to his own wisdom but
according to the wisdom of a craftsman. And the craftsman does not build according to his own wisdom, rather he
has plans and records in order to know how to make rooms and corridors. The Holy One blessed by He did the
same. He looked into the Torah and created the world
(Ber. Rab. 1:1).

This certainly evokes the image of an architect, who constructs first the plan of a
building and then supervises the implementation of his plan in the erection of the actual
building. But the architect can then walk away and leave his building to exist without his
further care. This is where the image of God as Architect falls short of the rabbinic
conception of God as Creator, for they see Him as having constant care for every aspect
of his creation. ‘His mercies are on all his creatures’. Yet even this can be seen in the
image of an engineer, who creates a machine and then gives it constant care, spanner in
hand, to correct any malfunction, or to supply any materials such as oil or water needed
to ensure its continued function. Nachmanides would not deny the machine analogy, but
he would point out that every machine exploits the regularities observed to occur in
Nature, and these regularities are not automatic, arising from the ultimate constitution
of a natural universe existing as an independent entity, but were enacted and inserted
by God, who continually renews and re-energises them.
Thus the argument really turns on the relationship between God and the universe.
Which is prior, God or Nature? Greek thought saw Nature as prior, and even the gods
were seen as coming into being in a natural setting. Jewish thought saw God as prior,
and Nature as a mere creation, which came into being by his Word out of nothing, and
would eventually pass away, leaving God alone.
This view finds philosophical formulation in the Talmudic saying, ‘Why is God called
‘the Place’ (hamaqom)? Because the universe is located in Him, not He in the universe’
(Gen R. 68). This saying amounts to what has been called ‘panentheism’, which differs
from pantheism in saying that while everything we know is God, it is only part of God.
The Talmudic saying differs too from the later conception of the Lurianic Kabbalah in
which God has to withdraw part of his essence in order to make space to create a
universe, which thenceforth is haunted by the vacuum, or absence of God, which was
necessary for its creation. This somewhat melancholy view, in which evil is seen as the
necessary concomitant of creation, the hollow at its heart, is foreign to the optimism of
the Talmud.
The Lurianic conception, however, has the merit of providing an explanation of the
puzzling notion of ‘creation from nothing’. If the universe is located in God, as the
Talmud says, why was it not always located in God? How did it come into being, unless
‘nothing’ is also somehow part of God's being? It should be noted that the expression
‘creation from nothing’ (creatio ex nihilo) is not actually part of the Jewish vocabulary,
but is a coinage of medieval Christian philosophy, an attempt to draw out the meaning of
the Jewish terms ‘creation’ and ‘beginning’5.
We may approach this issue from a different angle by asking the question, ‘Does God
in some way need his Creation, or is he utterly self-sufficient?’ One answer (given in the
name of R. Kattina) suggests God's self-sufficiency: it is said that eventually, after the
millennia have passed, God will end all creation and reign alone (b. Sanhedrin 97a). This
however is said, as it appears, only to give some application to the prophecy of Isaiah,
‘And the Lord alone shall be exalted in that day’ (Isa. 2:11), and the period of God's
solitary reign is limited to 1000 years, or at the most 2000, after which a populated
world will resume.
More explicit is the Midrash (quoted above) which says that God, before the present
universe, was ‘creating worlds and destroying them’, which suggests that it is part of
the nature of God to engage in creation rather than to live in solitary splendour.
 A God who does not create but lives alone is not the God of rabbinic Judaism. The
broadest conception of God to be found in the texts is that of God the Artist. An artist
does not create his work out of nothing, but out of his own being, and once created, it is
both outside and inside him. There are many passages in both Bible and Talmud that
express this paradox. God creates, but what he creates is God. For example, the book of
Genesis says that Adam was created from the earth, but what brought him to life was
that God breathed his own breath into him. Thus the life of man is actually the breath of
God; every person is the incarnation of God. The Talmud says that every human being is
generated by three partners: the mother, the father and God (b. Kiddushin 30b).
One daring aggadah even says that the verse which speaks of ‘the spirit of God
moving upon the face of the waters’ (Gen. 1:2) is referring to the soul of Man (Gen. R.
8:1). (This, of course, does not rule out other aggadic interpretations, since multiple
contradictory interpretations are permitted in aggadah). This soul is separate from God,
and yet derives from the substance of God Himself, and is therefore called ‘the spirit of
God’.
This provides a model of the rabbinic view of Creation. The world and all that is in it
were not created from nothing, but from God. They exist outside God in the same sense
that an artist's creations exist outside him, and they are separate from Him only in the
sense that they are objectivizations of His thought and imagination. In every artistic
creation, there is a dichotomy between matter and spirit. Without matter, there can be
no art. The essence of art is the moulding and manipulation of matter by the imagination
of the artist. There is an encounter between spirit and matter, in which the artist
triumphs over formlessness, and shapes it to his own perception, making it an
expression of his inner being. God too is depicted as battling with formlessness, for His
first encounter is with tohu vavohu. There is a theological problem here: what was the
status of this primeval formlessness with which God grappled? Was the tohu vavohu also
created by God, or did it exist independently of Him, in which case a dualism is set up
uncharacteristic of Judaism? The Talmud, in fact, does not tolerate such dualism, and
insists that even tohu vavohu were created by God (b. Hagigah 12a). He is like an artist
who, in the absence of stone, creates a formless mass of synthetic stone in order to be
able to chip it away to make a sculpture.
If God is an Artist, artistic activity is necessary to Him. His nature is to produce and
create, which He does ceaselessly. He cannot be said, therefore, not to need his
creatures; yet the aggadah frequently says just this. What is meant, however, is that he
does not need any particular creatures, and indeed can at times become so dissatisfied
that He destroys his work. But this does not imply cessation of his artistic activity, but
rather, on the contrary, a continual desire to create something better. His difficulty,
however, is that He does not want to create automata, but living beings with the faculty
of choice, so that He is constantly faced with the dilemma that His creation is moving in
an undesirable direction just because he chose to give it the ability to do so. He is often
tempted to call the experiment a failure, but if He were to cancel it, He would injure
Himself by destroying one of His own most attractive possibilities.
This may seem to make God very human and limited in His options. But this only to
say that the Jewish God is active and creative. The Aristotelian God is entirely without
limitations, functioning as the infinite background of the universe. But he is also entirely
static, and the universe which he validates (without creating) is also static, in that it is
merely working out its inherent possibilities. In the Aristotelian universe, Time is an
illusion. In the Jewish universe, on the contrary, Time is real, in so far as it is necessary
for the conception of God as continually innovating, though a distinction needs to be
made between time as measured and Time as Duration. The Midrash says that one of
the ten things created by God in the Beginning was ‘the length of the year’, and this has
been taken to mean that this was the creation of Time. This however is inconsistent with
the picture of God creating and destroying worlds previously. The ‘length of the year’, I
suggest, means measured time, which is distinguished from the duration without which
God would be merely static6.
What, then, is the role of the Torah in this Divine artistic career? To call it the
blueprint of Creation is only an approximation, for a true artist does not work with
blueprint in hand, but rather with a conception which is prior but achieves full
articulation only in the course of the work. But a human artist often (perhaps always)
feels that his work falls short of the original conception, which shows that he has a full
knowledge, though partly unconscious, of the perfection at which he aims. In the case of
God, this dichotomy between the perfection of the concept and the imperfection of the
realised concept, is the dichotomy between the Torah and the World.
But is this not to etherealize the Torah and to detach it from its proper role as guide to
human conduct and especially as constituting a code for a priestly people? How did the
laws of permissible foods or the laws of purity and impurity help God towards the
construction of a world? How did the accounts of the Exodus from Egypt and the
wanderings in the Desert help God's creative and artistic aims?
We may resort at this point to allegory or to mysticism, employing the methods of
either Philo (in his philosophical allegorization of the Torah) or of the Kabbalah (with its
mystical allegorisation). But the rabbis, on the whole, were opposed to allegory as a
method of exegesis. How then did they conceive of God using the Torah as a guide to the
creation of the universe? Did they really think that the Torah existed word for word
before the creation of the world, including not only the account of Creation itself, but
the entire history of the world from the birth of Adam to the death of Moses? In that
case, the events described already existed, and occurred not by the interplay of human
will and action, but merely as the unrolling of a pre-existent spool of film. Such
determinism is foreign to the outlook of the rabbis, who rejected the apocalyptic
literature (such as Enoch) which saw history as a predetermined scenario. It is foreign
also to the spirit of the Hebrew Bible, which sees even inspired prophecy, such as that of
Jonah, as consisting of warnings of coming disasters that may be avoided by repentance.
The rabbis' concept of the Torah as the blueprint of Creation is based on the biblical
portrayal of Wisdom, in the book of Proverbs. Here wisdom is personified and given a
part in the Creation:
The Lord possessed me in the beginning of his way, before his works of old. I was set up from everlasting, from
the beginning or ever the earth was. When there were no depths, I was brought forth; when there were no
fountains abounding with water. Before the mountains were settled, before the hills was I brought forth. While as
yet he had not made the earth, nor the fields nor the highest part of the dust of the world. When he prepared the
heavens, I was there: when he set a compass upon the face of the depth.
(Proverbs 8:22–27).

It was natural that the rabbis identified this remarkable personification of Wisdom as
the Torah. Philo had seen the Wisdom of this passage as identical with the Greek
concept of the Logos, and the Gospel of John equates the Logos with Jesus Christ, so
that Jesus became the creative principle of the universe. But even for the rabbis,
Wisdom represented the essence of the Torah, rather than the Torah in its manifestation
as a book containing stories and precepts. The rabbis distinguished between the spirit of
the Torah and its matter. When God is represented in the Midrash as creating the
universe with the aid of the Torah, this is by no means a deification of the Torah or an
importation of duality into God, but an expression of the complexity of the mind of the
artist seeking to convert his inspiration into an external production.
The Aggadah is thus a vehicle for philosophical conceptions that are at times daring
and uninhibited, portraying a universe and a God that are never static, even if this
means limiting God's powers in some ways, and divesting humanity of its centrality by
envisaging other worlds.
1Deut. 26:5. This expression of humility, however, is diverted from its true meaning in
the Haggadah, by being translated ‘An Aramean (Laban) tried to destroy my father’.
2
This is one of the ‘value concepts’ — formulations created by the rabbis and not found
in the Scriptural text except by implication — on which Max Kadushin built his
characterization of rabbinic Judaism (see Chapter 15).
3
These thinkers, however, saw the continuous intervention of God as implying a
complete determinism in events and a denial of human free will. These conclusions
were not drawn by Jewish occasionalists such as Nachmanides.
4
An awareness of the problem of natural/divine order is shown in the aggadic saying
that certain miraculous objects were built into the Creation: ‘Ten things were created
on the eve of Sabbath in the twilight: the mouth of the earth (Num. 16:32); the mouth
of the well (Num. 21:16); the mouth of the ass (Num. 22:28); the rainbow; the manna;
 the rod (Exod. 4:17); the Shamir (a miraculous worm used for splitting the rocks from
which the Temple was built); the shape of the written characters and the writing of the
tablets; and the tablets themselves. Some say the demons also, and the graves of
Abraham and Moses. And some say, tongs that are made with tongs’ (Avot, 5:6). This
passage seems to be trying to save the uniformity of Nature by asserting that
miraculous events were programmed from the first, and are thus not breaches of the
natural order. The rainbow, shown to Noah as a sign of the covenant between God and
man, is evidently thought of as appearing then for the first time to Noah, though its
appearance was scheduled from the Beginning. The item ‘tongs that are made with
tongs’ tries to cope with another problem, however. If a pair of tongs can be made
only by using a pair of tongs, how did the first tongs come into existence? Only by
being created by God. This problem may be extended to cover the whole of artefact
and tool construction, which we now see as subject to a long process of evolution from
the Stone Age onwards. But the Mishnah, not having this evolutionary perspective,
regards with awe the existence of human tools and machinery as a kind of miracle
requiring a divine origin. A similar feeling produced among the Greeks the legend of
Prometheus and the divine fire, except that this legend sees the acquisition of fire,
essential to civilization, as the result of hubristic theft rather than divine benevolence.
5Theverse ‘He hangs the earth over nothing’ (Job 26:7) is sometimes cited as a
Scriptural expression of creatio ex nihilo. The Hebrew belimah, however, appears to
mean here ‘empty space’ rather than ‘nothing’.
6SeeMaccoby (2001) for discussion of Crescas's attempt to distil a non-Aristotelian
time-theory from biblical and rabbinic material.
 3
THE TALMUD AND MORAL THEORY

The philosophy of the Talmud is primarily about morality, rather than about the nature
of reality. Western philosophy, on the contrary, sought to explore the universe in which
we find ourselves, asking such questions as, ‘What is it made of?’, ‘What are the most
reliable modes of exploring reality — through the senses or through mathematical or
logical reasoning?’ Here the philosopher himself is regarded as an observer, who stands
over against the observed world, examining himself only in so far as he questions the
reliability of his organs or instruments of observation.
Kant was immediately popular with Jewish thinkers because he overturned the Greek
model and reverted to morality as the essence of philosophy. He carried epistemological
scepticism to such a point that epistemology became the subversion of Western
philosophy instead of its foundation. Both our senses and our rationality, he
demonstrated, are remote from outside reality; they are merely our prism through which
reality filters without revealing its inner nature. But if we turn not outwards but
inwards, we do find true reality, in the decisions and actions we perform in relation to
fellow humans.
Kant himself, however, did not see his work as in any way reinstating the viewpoint of
Judaism. So far from seeing Judaism as a religion centred on morality, he saw it as non-
moral, or even anti-moral1. This is because he attached to Judaism the label of
‘heteronomy’. Thus Kant, out of his definition of morality, was able to continue the scorn
of Judaism that had animated Christian thinking for so many previous centuries. While
Kant's philosophical condemnation of Judaism echoed previous theological
condemnation, it also foreshadowed the course of subsequent philosophical
condemnation of Judaism in the works of Hegel, Fichte, Bauer, Marx and others (see the
excellent survey by Paul Lawrence Rose2), where Judaism is stigmatized as ‘cold-
hearted’ and ‘calculating’, and as lacking all true moral quality. But this philosophical
scorn was itself the reflection of previous theological scorn expressed in terms of an
opposition between ‘faith’ and ‘works’. Whether theological or philosophical, this scorn
was directed against what was perceived as a mechanical or outward quality in Jewish
moral behaviour. It did not come from the heart. It was concerned with expectation of
reward and punishment, rather than with performance of the moral deed for its own
sake.
Kant and Hegel were still concerned to compare Judaism unfavourably with
Christianity and so to vindicate the Christian claim to have transcended its parent-
religion. The successors of Kant and Hegel, however, were open atheists, and therefore
might have been expected to detach themselves from the Christianity-Judaism conflict
or even to question the Christian claim to superiority. In the event, they did no such
thing. In fact, the Hegelian pattern of spiritual progress was so imprinted on their minds
that the superiority of Christianity to Judaism was an axiom that only had to be
translated into atheistic dialectical terms; indeed, in the course of this translation, the
contrast was even heightened, and Judaism became more contemptible than before.
Christianity, divested of its dogma, was still the inspiration of the new idealistic atheism;
and transformed into contemporary terms, the ideal State (often identified as the
German State) became the new Church, with the Jews as its chief enemies and
subverters, pursuing materialistic, degenerate aims. The identification of the Jews as the
archetypal money-grubbers, whose activities impeded the emergence of a new society of
chivalry and nobility, owed much to the medieval image of the Jews as usurers, but also
to the conception of Jewish morality as a system devoid of inner quality.
If one looks at Judaism, however, without the presuppositions and prejudices of
Christian and post-Christian schematization, one finds a Weltanschauung in which
morality is central. It is true that this morality is expressed in the form of
commandments, and that the giver of the commandments is God, an all-powerful Being
inspiring fear. This is why Kant was so sure that the Jewish scheme was heteronomous
— for how could human morality spring from human moral decision if it was constrained
by fear of punishment or hope of reward? To be genuinely moral, an action had to spring
from the conviction that it was right, and not from any motivation of fear or even love.
True, Kant himself used the language of commandment, calling the demands of morality
‘imperatives’, but the demand arose from contemplation of the act and its
consequences, not from any commanding figure, whether human or divine. The
command was to be issued by logic, not even by any altruistic tendency (such as posited
by Hume). It had to be rational through and through; otherwise, however salutary in its
effects, it would be a mere animal response dictated by instinct. Kant found this logical
validation in universalisation; only an act that could be generalized to apply to all
rational beings without self-contradiction could be regarded as truly moral.
This Kantian view of morality as a kind of objective calculus is actually not absent
from the Judaism of the Hebrew Bible and the Talmud, though not as an exclusive moral
schema ruling out other approaches. For example, we find in the book of Deuteronomy,
Tor what nation is there so great that has statutes and judgments so righteous as all this
law, which I set before you this day?’ (Deut. 4:8). Here the Israelites are invited to
submit the commandments of the law to the appraisal of their own faculties, and to
judge them in the light of their own intellect and moral sense. The word ‘God’ is not
even mentioned in this appeal, either as an object of fear or even as an object of love.
The law is to be examined on its own merits as a righteous code of behaviour embodying
principles of equality and fairness; whether its giver is fearsome or lovable is beside the
point. True, even in this formulation some of the Kantian requirements are lacking. The
law still comes from outside, not from within. Human judgment is to be exercised on
something presented to it, not on something welling from its own resources. But the
presupposition is that human faculties are equal to the task of reception and
appreciation. The situation envisaged is that of minds that are not quite strong enough
to find the answers to their moral questionings, but entirely capable of recognising the
answers when these are presented to them. Involved in the phenomenology of the
situation are not merely moral and intellectual capabilities, but gratitude and love
towards the source of kindly instruction. The situation is one of education. It is not the
world of fully formed intellects that Kant seems to require, each proceeding towards its
own conclusions without outside help, whether of parents or society, and somehow
arriving at decisions without hesitations or delays. It is the more realistic world of
groping half-formed intellects for whom societal tradition is a support, rather than an
enemy of individual moral growth. In this Deuteronomic passage, God (or Moses) is a
good parent, teaching moral values by appealing to the existing or awakening moral
faculties of the child.
Even more unequivocally Kantian are two other formulations of the Hebrew Bible:
1. Abraham's reproof of God. When Abraham seeks to reverse God's judgment on the
Cities of the Plain, he says to God: ‘Shall not the judge of all the earth do justice?’
(Genesis 18:25). Here God himself is required to bow to the principle of justice, to which
he, like every rational being, is subject.
2. The pursuit of justice ‘Justice, justice shalt thou pursue’ (Deut. 16:20). This is a plea
for abstract justice, which, paradoxically, is expressed with passion (AV's translation
‘that which is altogether just shalt thou follow’ loses the urgent poetry of the original
Hebrew). While pointing to the Kantian purity of this formulation (justice is an end quite
divorced from either the fear or the love of God) we may ask how, on Kantian principles,
the passion enters into the matter. Moral passion hardly seems to be part of Kant's
moral vision, and may be even be opposed to it, as interposing an element of emotion
where there should be passionless adherence to duty (here Kant also parts company
with the Christian moral tradition, in which love is the most important ingredient).
Talmudic insights may help us to grasp the link between justice and passion. Meanwhile,
I would suggest that, in the biblical context, the passion derives from a Utopian vision of
society. The continuation of the sentence is ‘in order that you may live and inherit the
land which the Lord your God gives you’. This is not a mere threat of expulsion in case
of failure to pursue justice; it is an assertion of the necessity of justice (here especially
the uncorrupted administration of courts of justice) to the fabric and continued being of
a society which is to invite love and loyalty. The Hebrew Bible continually offers the
Land for contemplation not merely as a place where the Israelites happen to live, but as
a political and moral project which they may or may not succeed in putting into
satisfactory operation.
There are thus adumbrations to be found of a Kantian concept of a moral calculus free
of emotional motivations as to its content, though never quite free from emotional
undertones of gratitude, admiration, love and political idealism as to its origin or
destination. Here, however, we may pause to consider the role of love in the
development of a moral schema. It has been the constant criticism directed against
Judaism by its successor or usurper Christianity that Judaism is deficient in love. Paul's
hymn to love is indirectly a criticism of the doctrine of good works attributed especially
to the Pharisees. Piling up credit marks for the punctilious performance of good deeds,
defined as fulfilment of commandments drawn up in black and white in the Torah, is
alleged to be the hallmark of Judaism, as opposed to the spontaneous outflow of
unpremeditated acts of love, unpredictable and unclassified, alleged to be characteristic
of Christianity. This charge of coldness and calculation has also played a major part in
antisemitic literature of a secular kind, which has derived its structure from Christianity
even when vociferating its freedom from Christian dogmas.
Yet the texts on which Christianity bases its doctrine of love are taken from the
Hebrew Bible and are fundamental to Judaism: ‘Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself’
(Leviticus 19:18) and ‘Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart and with all
thy soul and with all thy might’ (Deuteronomy 6:5). In fact, the New Testament itself
cites these texts (Matthew 19:19) as central in Judaism, not as the manifesto of a new or
revolutionary moral attitude.
But how can these texts be reconciled with the threats and promises of reward which
the Torah also offers as inducements to good behaviour? If adherence to the
commandments is to proceed from love of God and love of humanity, why this lavish use
of the stick and the carrot?
The answer seems to be that the Hebrew Bible employs not one formulation of
morality but many. Every possible way is used to induce the Israelites to conform to the
injunctions of the Torah: inducements of fear, of self-interest and reward, of love or
loyalty, and also appeals to an innate sense of morality and justice. An important
premise for this multiple approach is that the Torah is concerned to create not so much
the righteous individual or saint as the righteous society. The aim is a community in
which the weak are protected and an ethos of kindly relations between all sections of
society is implanted. Accordingly, imperfect motivations are not banished or outlawed,
but are considered to have their usefulness in the building of society.
Here a Talmudic saying is relevant: Even to do good for an ulterior motive (shelo
lishmah) should be encouraged, because through acting for an ulterior motive one may
finally develop into a person who performs good for its own sake (b. Pesachim 50b).
This is a concept of morality which may lack the purity demanded by Kant. But it has
compassion for human imperfection, and bears in mind the needs of society, which
needs its members to adhere to a minimum code of decency even if many of them do so
for what the purist regards as inadequate motives. It allows for a process of maturation,
or education, in the acquisition of a moral personality, and also for a society in which
individuals live at different moral levels, yet somehow manage to cooperate. It is a view
that is attractive in many ways, yet raises many theoretical difficulties for a coherent
moral theory.
Here we may turn to consider a moral concept that is fundamental to both biblical and
rabbinic Judaism, and which mediates between private and public morality, and also
between autonomous and heteronomous morality. This is the concept of ‘covenant’. A
thorough understanding of this concept will go far towards an overall comprehension of
the Jewish contribution to ethical theory. As an approach, let us look at two apparently
antithetical passages in the Talmud, both dealing with the giving of the Law on Mount
Sinai.
1. The nations of the world were asked to receive the Law, in order not to give them an
excuse for saying, ‘Had we been asked, we might have accepted it/ They were asked
but they did not accept it, as it is said, ‘The Lord came from Sinai and rose up from
Seir unto them; he shined forth from Mount Paran (Deut. 33:2) … But when he came
to Israel, they all said with one accord, ‘All that the Lord has said, we will do, and we
will be obedient (Exod. 24:7)’. (Mekh. Yitro, 5, see also Sifre Deut., Berakhah, 343,
and elsewhere).
2. God caused Sinai to tower menacingly over the children of Israel and said to them ‘If
you accept the Torah it will be well with you; if not, here will be your burial.’ (b.
Shabb. 88a).
These two passages appear to give opposite messages about the binding nature of the
Torah revealed on Mount Sinai. According to the first passage, the Israelites had the
opportunity to refuse the Torah, like the other nations to whom it was offered. The
Israelites' acceptance was entirely voluntary. They entered into a covenant with God as
equal partners. Yet according to the second passage, this was far from the case. Their
acceptance is still required, but it is under duress. Unless they sign on the dotted line,
they will be buried under the weight of Mount Sinai.
It is not unusual with the Talmud to give two opposite views of a troubling question,
thereby providing a dialectical basis for some deeper synthesis. These two views of the
nature of covenant are essential to each other, even if apparently contradictory.
The first view, on its own, endears itself to the Kantian philosopher by its freedom
from heteronomy. The adherence of the Jew to the Torah, on this view, is a voluntary
commitment. This means that every time a Jew fulfils a commandment of the Torah, he
is freely willing the terms of the equal covenant entered into by his ancestors. He is
bound by these terms because he, or rather his ancestors, have willed to be bound by
them. As a member of the community of Israel, he honours the commitments of his
community, just as the government of a country (and therefore also its citizens), honours
the international treaties which it has signed. This communal aspect of covenant is
indeed a departure from the Kantian model, which envisages only individual
commitments; but the elements of voluntariness and honour are symptomatic of
autonomy.
On the other hand, there is even in this model an element of arbitrary obedience. The
rabbis noted that the expression of acquiescence took the form (in a literal translation),
‘We will do and we will hear’; an expression that implied that the Israelites were willing
to obey the Torah even before they knew what it contained. This blanket acceptance
hardly amounts to an intelligent endorsement of the commandments; yet the rabbis
regarded this as a point in the Israelites' favour. The Israelites trusted God and his
messenger, Moses, so much that they were ready to accept the commandments in
advance. This trust, the rabbis thought, was itself a moral decision, for the Israelites had
experienced the delivery from Egypt and therefore owed a debt of gratitude and trust.
In contrast, the Israelites, at other junctures, were guilty of ingratitude, when they
rebelled against Moses.
The second model, however, seems to contain no moral element at all, but only cowed
obedience in the face of a mortal threat. Why did the rabbis add this scenario to the
picture of voluntary acquiescence which they had painted in the first model? Are these
two irreconcilable views (advocated as so often happens by different and conflicting
rabbis), or can they somehow be included in some broader perspective?
The two scenarios, it should be noted, are at opposite poles. In one there is too much
voluntary acceptance — an acceptance so generous that it does not even require
examination of the goods offered. In the other, there is no voluntary acceptance at all.
Again there is no examination of the goods, but only because no such examination is
allowed. Why is there no intermediate model, in which the Israelites declare a
willingness to accept the Torah after due examination of its contents? Why is there no
negotiating phase, as in the case of ordinary human contracts, in which the contents of
the proposed document are discussed between the equal parties before the signing
ceremony is performed?
 Such negotiation does in fact take place, in the rabbinic story, when the Torah is
offered to other nations before it is offered to the Israelites. The other nations (the
Edomites and the Ishmaelites) do indeed ask what is in the Torah, so that they can
assess whether to accept it or not, and then when given some unpalatable extracts
which might interfere with their life-styles, they reject it. Only the Israelites accept the
Torah sight unseen.
I think that this imaginative story gives us a clue to the nature of the contract or
covenant that the rabbis envisage as the basic departure-point of Judaism and of its
moral system. The essence of the Torah is that it is a new beginning. It is a revolutionary
document. Like the Communist Manifesto or the American Declaration of Independence,
it does not aim at summarizing existing moral doctrine or systematizing classifications
already in practice. It looks to the future rather than to the past. Consequently, any
commitment to it must be a leap into the dark. It requires trust and boundless faith in
the inspiration of the springs of the revolution. The quasi-canonical status of the
founding documents of the Communist, French and American revolutions are the
analogue of the canonical status of the Torah as founding document of the Israelite
revolution.
The two stories we have been considering may be better understood by enquiring into
their revolutionary purpose. Here I am following the exegetical method of Michael
Walzer in his study of the revolutionary pattern of Exodus — a method which can be
fruitfully extended to the study of rabbinic literature3. The two stories together may be
regarded as reflecting two inevitable aspects of revolution, which may seen clearly in
the development of Communism in the Soviet Union. The Communist leaders faced the
problem of implementing communism in a country that, on the whole, was not ready for
it. The people of the USSR, as Communist theory acknowledged, were far less ripe for
communization than the peoples of the industrialized West, yet these were the only
people, as chance and historical exigency would have it, who had given the movement
an opportunity of implementing its new theory of society. Two methods now presented
themselves; the infusion of enthusiasm for change into to the masses by inspiring
leadership; and alternatively, the use of force and repression to overcome their inertia.
In practice, both methods were tried; but the failure of the first more optimistic method
led to the almost exclusive use of the second, with results eventually fatal to
revolutionary hopes. Yet both methods were actuated (at first, at any rate) by idealism
and the conviction that Communism had to be introduced by hook or crook in order to
save the world from disaster.
The story of Exodus gave the rabbis two contrasting portrayals of the Israelite people,
facing a new vision of society embodied in the Torah. In one portrayal they are full of
faith and courage, and in the other they are rebellious and immature, constantly failing
to rise to the level of understanding required of them. The rabbinic aggadah, amplifying
and meditating on the biblical story, dwells on both portrayals. The two portrayals are
not really incompatible; it is natural that a people, raw from slavery, should oscillate
between enthusiasm for their new-found freedom and misgivings about the awesome
trials of an uncharted future. The history of revolutions is full of such vertigo.
A revolutionary morality is different, in many ways, from the morality of a settled state
of affairs. Kant's picture of an individual, consulting his own conscience and sedately
balancing the universal and the particular, is hardly appropriate to a time of political
explosion, when a long-established tyranny has been suddenly abolished. When such an
explosion is accompanied by a manifesto of liberation, an inspired rationale of the past,
present and future, in the light of which a new world is to arise and the old tyranny is to
be prevented from returning in a new guise, a problem arises in relation to the masses
who are unable to grasp the totality of the revolutionary doctrine. Somehow they must
be dragooned into acceptance, or the new world will never get under way. The two
possible methods — eloquent fiery persuasion and violent repression — are not
essentially different, because both bypass the slow processes of individual decision. The
Torah story (with its aggadic development in the Talmud) shows Moses using both
methods, and the people responding appropriately to both. When persuasion fails to
produce the enthusiastic (and mindless) response, ‘We will do and we will hear’, the
method of repression is adopted (the mountain hovers threateningly over their heads).
They must be dragged, willy-nilly, into the new world. The rabbis (who invented the
myth of the inverted mountain) are responding to the Torah's presentation of a
revolutionary situation in which an inspired leader has the task of moulding the clay of
an unready people.
The people, indeed, are the subject of an unflattering portrayal in both the biblical
sources and their rabbinic commentaries. Yet the Israelites are contrasted favourably (in
the rabbinic midrash) to the other nations, the Edomites and the Ishmaelites, who reject
the Torah when offered it. The other nations enquire what is in the Torah, and when told
that it contains commandments that are unpalatable they refuse to accept it. The
Israelites, however, accept it without even enquiring what is in it. The real contrast here
is between cultures that are already formed and a culture that has yet to be born. The
Edomites and the Ishmaelites already have a culture, whereas the Israelites are a tabula
rasa, a people which has no land and has just been torn away from its previous setting.
The Edomites and Ishmaelites, in the Midrashic story, do not wish to give up their
militaristic way of life in order to adopt a Torah of non-violence; but the Israelites have
no way of life to sacrifice and are happy to be offered one. From God's point of view, the
Israelites are eligible just because of their lack of a distinctive culture, though this
means that they have everything to learn, and must go through a painful process of
education in which they often seem to be an unattractive and recalcitrant people.
Thus, from the standpoint of our enquiry into the rabbinic theory of morality, the
Torah story on which this theory is based affords a radical perspective because it is
really not so much about morality itself as about the birth and origin of morality, or in
Nietzsche's phrase, ‘the genealogy of morals’. It belongs to the genre of those theories
which picture, usually in story form, how morality began. Two celebrated theories of this
kind are Rousseau's myth of the Social Contract and Freud's myth of the primeval
parricide, followed by the pact or contract between the parricidal brothers. Rousseau's
theory is a particularly enlightening parallel.
Kant's charge of ‘heteronomy’ against the morality of Judaism cannot be substantiated
by consideration of the circumstances in which the morality of Judaism was, or was
pictured to be, first born. We need to formulate a clear distinction between morality in
its birth-throes and the morality of a settled culture or community, (or of an individual
within such a community), and any total theory of morality must contain both aspects
and explain the relationship between them, as Kant's own theory does not. Rabbinic
Judaism has something very interesting to contribute to such an enquiry.
1
Kant (1793).
2
Rose(1990).
3Walzer (1985).
 4
THE RABBINIC SOCIAL CONTRACT

Rousseau himself recognised the affinity between his Social Contract theory and the
moral basis of Judaism. Rousseau was almost alone among Enlightenment thinkers in his
generous, appreciative approach to Judaism. Whereas other thinkers of the period, such
as Voltaire and d'Holbach, regarded Judaism as a much inferior, barbarous early version
of Christianity, with which Christianity itself should be reproached, Rousseau recognised
the obvious fact that Judaism was a religion with a viewpoint of its own that contrasted
strongly and favourably with that of Christianity. Whereas Voltaire and d'Holbach spoke
of the Jews only with a contempt which they had learnt from the religion from which
they professed to be emancipated, Rousseau was sufficiently liberated from his
historical background to be able to take a fresh look at the Jews and Judaism and
actually to express admiration.
Here are some of Rousseau's remarks on Judaism:
‘… an astonishing and truly unique spectacle is to see an expatriated people, who have had neither place nor land
for nearly two thousand years, a people mingled with foreigners, no longer having perhaps a single descendant of
the early races, a scattered people, dispersed over the world, enslaved, persecuted, scorned by all nations,
nonetheless preserving its characteristics, its laws, its customs, its patriotic love of the early social union, when
all ties with it seem broken. The Jews provide us with an astonishing spectacle: the laws of Numa, Lycurgus,
Solon are dead; the very much older laws of Moses are still alive. Athens, Sparta, Rome have perished and no
longer have children left on earth; Zion, destroyed, has not lost its children.
They mingle with all the nations and never merge with them; they no longer have leaders, and are still a nation;
they no longer have a homeland, and are always citizens of it.
What must be the strength of legislation capable of working such wonders, capable of braving conquests,
dispersions, revolutions, exiles, capable of surviving the customs, laws, empire of all the nations, and which finally
promises them, by these trials, that it is going to continue to sustain them all, to conquer the vicissitudes of things
human, and to last as long as the world? Of all the systems of legislation which are known to us, some are
theoretical creations the feasibility of which is even disputed; others have only produced a few followers, others
have never made a well-constituted State, except this one which has undergone all trials and has always
withstood them. Jew and Christian agree in recognizing in this the finger of God, who according to one, is
maintaining his nation, and according to the other, punishing it, but any man whosoever he is, must acknowledge
this as a unique marvel, the causes of which divine or human, certainly deserve the study and admiration of the
sages, in preference to all that Greece and Rome offer of what is admirable in the way of political institutions and
human settlements.’1

These unpublished remarks go beyond anything that Rousseau wrote for publication,
and indeed are incompatible with some remarks that he did publish, which are closer to
Enlightenment anti-semitism of the Voltairean type, though never so virulent. But here
Rousseau actually applies his own principles to the Jews. Instead of parroting the
alleged contradiction between law and morality which was the heritage of Christianity
from Pauline antinomianism (though in practice Christians found that law is an
inevitable condition of morality), Rousseau remembers his own theory of Social
Contract, by which the voluntary acceptance of a community-law is the foundation of all
civilized society.
Rousseau sees the separateness of the Jewish community not as an offence against
humanity (as had been argued from the days of Hellenistic antisemitism onwards), but
as a living instance of his own view of morality as rooted in community and tradition.
Rousseau does not inveigh against the alleged particularism of the Jews, which in
practice only amounts to their resistance to a surrounding imperialist culture which
prides itself on its ineffable superiority. Nor does Rousseau accuse the Jews of racism;
he notes correctly that the Jews have mixed with so many races (by their acceptance of
proselytes) that they ‘no longer perhaps have a single descendant of the early races’; yet
this has not affected their cohesion as a covenant-based community2.
 There are indeed multiple connections between Rousseau's notion of a Social Contract
and the Judaic notion of ‘covenant’. It is interesting that Rousseau points to other law-
givers, Numa, Lycurgus, Solon as analogous to Moses in laying down a conscious
constitution for a state. He also mentions that many constitutions have been proposed
that were never put into practice, or lasted for only a short period. Some were merely
theoretical from the start, some even being cast in the form of fiction. Plato's Republic,
More's Utopia are prominent examples. These instances, whether practical or
theoretical, all portray the origins of a society as based on consent to a proposed
constitution. In the case of Rome, Sparta and Athens, the narrative is of a society
already in existence which consents to a thorough-going reform by which it is
reconstituted on a new theoretical basis. These models, however, are not revolutionary.
The previous form of society was not overthrown, but jettisoned voluntarily by all the
citizens in deference to the legislator, whose wisdom was recognised in advance by his
appointment. There is an element of ‘We shall do and we shall hear’ (acceptance in
advance) in all these instances by the very conditions of the appointment of a legislator
assumed to be wise. Yet the proposed constitution still has to receive popular consent;
which implies that some kind of consensual constitution was already in existence even
before the appointment of a legislator.
Rousseau's theory of the Social Contract, as an account of the origins of society and
morality, is notoriously open to logical objection. Ernest Gellner sums up the objections
as follows3: ‘Both foundation mythologies and philosophical social contract theories in
general suffer from certain weaknesses. Mythologies tend to indulge in a kind of
childishness and narrowness. They tell us how the world began and, in the course of
telling the story, assume the existence of a world within which the world is being born.
Thus, for instance, the Judeao-Christian story tells of the origin of mankind with the
primal couple, but then assumes that their offspring interact with other people! This led
some Africans, who had been told the story by missionaries, to infer, as they told the
anthropologist Isaac Schapira, that some unmentioned incest must have occurred which
explained the existence of those others, and that this was the clue to the whole story4.
The narrative circularity of mythologies, which assume a world within which the world
comes into being, is matched by the logical circularity of philosophers' theories: they
have great difficulty in explaining how, in a world where only the primary contract
makes other contracts binding, the initial contract, itself devoid of any prior
underwriting, could itself also be binding. The regress of validations applies to contracts
as it does to anything else.’
The narrative of the covenant of Sinai does not profess to depict the birth of morality
or society itself. On the contrary, the Torah sets this covenant at a relatively late date in
history, after great civilizations had come and gone. The Sinai Covenant, therefore, does
not share in the logical flaw that has been charged against accounts of the birth of
morality such as Freud's theory in Totem and Taboo, or Rousseau's Social Contract
theory. The Sinai covenant is presented to a people who have already had a long
experience of living in society, whether as free people, in the period of the patriarchs, or
as slaves in Egypt. Moreover, the Israelites are not represented as the primeval people
whose foundation was in the dawn of history, even though the Sinai covenant does
function as a foundation document, marking the emergence of the Israelites as a fully-
formed nation. And yet the Sinai covenant is represented as a landmark in the history of
morality. There is here, as Rousseau points out, much similarity to the narratives of the
foundation of the polities of Sparta, Athens and Rome, in which an already existent
community, dissatisfied with its own haphazard organisation, calls on a revered
individual to design a written constitution by which its future path is to be determined.
The situation is even more similar to that of the foundation of the American nation,
where the drawing up of a constitution, ratified by consensus, took place simultaneously
with the commencement of national status, and this new status became the occasion for
the inclusion in the constitution of new idealistic concepts of the rights and duties of
citizens.
Rousseau's Social Contract has thus in fact happened many times in the history of
humanity and has often been associated with important advances in the morality of
living together in society. The concept cannot account for the appearance of morality
itself, since every Social Contract presupposes an existent sense of morality. But Social
Contract theory does explain very well how a community can make a new start, and this
indeed has been the effect of Rousseau's construction itself, which inspired many reform
movements. Further, the narrative of a Social Contract, as a founding myth, can produce
at intervals a renewal of the idealism with which a society began. In Judaism, a
perceived degeneration in society was often countered by a New Covenant, in which the
leaders of society pledged themselves anew to the principles of the original covenant of
Sinai. The concept of the communal pledge or vow has been important in the history of
morality; in any theory of morality, we must make room for the idea of dedication on a
communal level, and therefore for the idea of moral particularism, bound to a specified
society, since a vow is limited to those who came together to make it. This, of course,
raises problems for those, like Kant, who insist on the total universality of moral
imperatives, and therefore find difficulty in accommodating the idea of dedication or
special vocation.
But if the Sinai Covenant is not regarded as the original Social Contract initiating
human society and morality, but rather as a milestone in human progress marking a new
dedication by a specific revolutionary group, what in fact is the biblical and rabbinic
theory of the origin of morality? The Hebrew Bible certainly does not contend that
morality began at Sinai, for it gives a long history of humanity before Sinai, containing
many figures of high spiritual and moral standing: Adam, Enoch, Noah, Abraham,
Jethro, Balaam, Job, for example. Where did these saintly and inspired figures get their
morality from? Was it an innate individual morality, or did it have a communal Social
Contract origin, with a basis in consent? Was there a covenant before Sinai?
In the rabbis' interpretation of Scripture, there was such a previous covenant; in fact,
they even discerned two previous covenants, one with Adam and one with Noah (see b.
Sanhedrin 59b).
The covenant with Adam was of little continuing importance, since it was superseded
by the covenant with Noah, with whom humanity made a fresh start. It is interesting,
however, that the Adam covenant was not the same as its successor covenant, but
differed in one particular. The generations before the Flood (who were all governed by
the Adam covenant) were not permitted to eat meat, whereas the subsequent Noah
covenant permitted it. This is deduced from the verses Gen. 1:29 (permitting only the
eating of vegetation to Adam) and Gen. 9:3 (permitting meat as well as vegetation to
Noah). This is part of a pattern of greater leniency on the part of God towards humanity,
signalised by Gen. 8:21.
But were these previous dispensations actually covenants, or were they rather one-
sided pieces of legislation, in which God laid down the law, and did not seek the assent
of either Adam or Noah? Moreover, there does not appear to be any vestige of
communal consultation or decision in these early dispensations. In each case, the laws
are pronounced by God to one person, though admittedly very little amounting to
community life existed at the times concerned.
The rabbis, however, do import an element of assent and covenant, at least into the
Noachic dispensation, when they depict the ‘nations’ as first accepting, and then failing
to implement, the Noachic laws. These laws are listed in the Tosefta as follows:
Seven commandments were given to the Sons of Noah:
to administer justice;
not to worship idols;
not to blaspheme;
not to engage in forbidden sexual relationships;
not to shed blood;
not to rob;
not to eat a limb from a live animal.
(Tosefta Avodah Zara 8:4)

In a much-criticised rabbinic passage (b. Avodah Zarah, 2b) the following account is
given of the Noachic dispensation:
The nations will then contend: Lord of the Universe, hast Thou given us the Torah, and have we declined to accept
it? (But how can they argue thus, seeing that it is written, The Lord came from Sinai and rose from Seir unto
them, He shined forth from Mount Paran? And it is also written, God cometh from Teman. What did He seek in
Seir, and what did He seek in Mount Paran? R. Johanan says: This teaches us that the Holy One, blessed be He,
 offered the Torah to every nation and every tongue, but none accepted it, until He came to Israel who received it.
[How, then, can they say that the Torah was not offered to them?] Their contention will be this: Did we accept it
and fail to observe it? But surely the obvious rejoinder to this their plea would be: Then why did you not accept it?
This, then, will be their contention: Lord of the Universe, didst Thou suspend the mountain over us like a vault as
Thou hast done unto Israel and did we still decline to accept it? For in commenting on the verse: And they stood at
the netherpart of the mountain R. Dimi b. Hama said: This teaches us that the Holy One, blessed be He,
suspended the mountain over Israel like a vault, and said unto them: If ye accept the Torah, it will be well with
you, but if not, there will ye find your grave. Thereupon the Holy One, blessed be He, will say to them: Let us then
consider the happenings of old, as it is said, Let them announce to us former things; there are seven
commandments which you did accept. Did you observe them? (How do we know that they did not observe them?
For R. Joseph learned: He standeth and shaketh the earth, He seeth and maketh the nations to tremble: what did
He see? He saw that the nations did not observe even the seven precepts which the sons of Noah had taken upon
themselves, and seeing that they did not observe them, He stood up and released them therefrom. Then they
benefited by it; according to this it pays to be a sinner! Said Mar the son of Rabina: The release from those
commands only means that even if they observed them they would not be rewarded. But why should they not? Is it
not taught: R. Meir used to say. Whence do we know that even a Gentile who studies the Torah is equal to a High
Priest? From the following verse: Ye shall therefore keep My statutes and My ordinances which, if a man do, he
shall live by them. It does not say ‘If a Priest, Levite, or Israelite do, he shall live by them,’ but ‘a man’; here, then,
you can learn that even a Gentile who studies the Torah is equal to a High Priest! What is meant, then, is that they
are rewarded not as greatly as one who does a thing which he is bidden to do, but as one who does a thing
unbidden. For, R. Hanina said: He who is commanded and does, stands higher then he who is not commanded and
does.

This Amoraic passage seems to be striving to be illiberal about Gentiles, but is

constantly forced back into a more liberal attitude by the earlier Tannaitic tradition,
which believes in the final salvation of the Gentiles.
The passage forms part of an elaborate set-piece about the Day of Judgment, when
God will judge both Israel and the nations and pronounce in favour of Israel and against
the Gentiles. The Gentiles come forward and plead their great practical achievements
(e.g. the building of roads and bridges and the enforcement of civil peace) which they
claim they have put to the service of Israel, to whom they have thereby afforded the
opportunity to study the Torah. These pleas are rejected by God, who alleges that these
achievements had unworthy, selfish motivations. Yet later in the passage, or catena of
passages, a certain credit is given to the Gentiles' claim, for ‘without the force applied
by the Roman government, people would eat each other alive’.
Then the Gentiles put forward another plea: how can they be blamed for not adhering
to the Torah, since God did not offer it to them? The answer is given that they were
offered it, but they refused. Only Israel accepted it. Then comes the curious plea: yes,
but you did not force us to accept it, whereas you showed favouritism to Israel by
forcing them to accept it. God's answer to this is: if I had forced you to accept it, you
would not have kept it, whereas Israel has kept it. The proof of this is that the Gentiles
have not observed even the milder code which they did accept, the Seven Noachic Laws.
(Later, the Gentiles challenge the claim that the Israelites observed the Torah, and when
God himself gives testimony that they did, the Gentiles challenge the legal right of God
to give testimony on behalf of Israel, whom he has declared to be His ‘first-born son’.
Does not the Torah disallow testimony from relatives?)
The passage then goes on a more dubious tack. Acknowledging that the Gentiles
‘accepted’ the Seven Noachic Laws, but alleging that they failed to observe them, the
assertion is now made that because of this failure the Seven Laws were withdrawn from
the Gentiles (at some point) who were now left without a code or covenant. This is a
radical assertion that has to meet objections. Would not this be a reward rather than a
punishment? (since Gentiles, having no code to which they were answerable, could now
sin without expectation of punishment). True. What is meant is that they would receive
neither punishment for sins nor reward for good deeds — and this lack of prospect of
reward would be their punishment for their failure to fulfil their code.
This is the nadir of illiberalism in the passage, and it is immediately dismissed by
citation of one of the peaks of rabbinic liberalism, the great saying of the Tanna, Rabbi
Meir, that ‘a Gentile who occupies himself with the Torah is equal to a High Priest’. This
authoritative saying makes it impossible to shut out the Gentiles from reward altogether.
Some shifting of the negative position is required and a compromise position is reached:
yes, a good deed by a Gentile does get some reward, but not the full reward he would
have got if the Noachic Covenant had not been cancelled. He gets the reward due to
someone who performs a good action or refrains from a bad action about which he has
not been commanded. The principle is then adduced (to support this solution) that
‘greater is he who performs what he has been commanded than he who performs
without having been commanded’.
It should be noted that, illiberal as this passage is, in trying to exclude the Gentiles
from their own covenant and therefore from the full benefits of the Messianic Age, there
are some redeeming features. First, the issue of punishment is never raised, only that of
reward. This contrasts favourably with a Christian account of Judgment Day, in which
the sheep are separated from the goats, who are condemned to ‘everlasting fire,
prepared for the devil and his angels’ (Matthew 25:41).
Secondly, the passage stresses that the vouchsafing of the Seven Laws to the Gentiles
involved a posture of acceptance on their part. This is not clear either from the biblical
passage on which the Seven Laws are based (where, on the contrary, God appears to be
issuing a fiat) or even from the passage in the Tosefta quoted above which simply says
that the Seven Laws were ‘given’ to the children of Noah. Yet the Talmudic passage,
prejudiced as it is against the Gentiles, is quite clear that the Seven Laws comprised a
Covenant, not merely a fiat, since consent was required. This refutes the view,
expressed by Lloyd Gaston5 and others, that the Seven Laws did not constitute a
covenant and that only in the doctrine of Paul can we find any provision for covenantal
status for Gentiles.
What then, in Talmudic thought, is the position of a covenantless person? Such a
person is thinkable, at least, for if consent is required for an offered covenant, it is
conceivable that a person or nation might prefer to be without any moral covenant and
therefore, it would seem, without any morality. This position of convenantlessness is
envisaged at one stage of the above argument and is even characterised as a happy
state in which a person can simply act as he/she wills without fear of punishment.
Such a state of amorality, it might be suggested, is envisaged in the Torah itself in its
description of the way of life of Ishmael and Esau. Of Ishmael it is said that ‘his hand
will be against every man’ and of Esau it is said that ‘he will live by the sword’. Ishmael
and Esau are thus the embodiment of Hobbes's natural man, living in a condition of pre-
moral aggression. But how could such a person ever progress to accepting a code of
morality? According to Hobbes, this could happen from motives of sheer selfishness,
since the Ishmaelite life is ‘nasty, brutish and short’, and pre-moral man is intelligent
enough to foresee the practical advantages of adopting a moral code rather than living
in a state of chaos. Hobbes's version of the Social Contract thus escapes from the
contradiction seen in other versions, since it conceives morality as arising without a
previous moral sense or motivation. Yet Hobbes's scheme would never lead to any
universal morality, but only to the kind of loyalty and submission required to form a
tribe, which would then be at war with other tribes. This is indeed the probable
conception behind the biblical descriptions of Ishmael and Esau, regarded not as sole
individuals but as whole cultures devoted to a predatory military programme or ideal. In
rabbinic thought, this is indeed the case: that is why the Gentiles are shown as having
refused the Torah, and also why their cultural achievements are dismissed as self-
serving, even though they did accept the Seven Laws. Their way of life, as predatory,
military communities, has breached the spirit of the Seven Laws to such an extent that
this covenant has been taken away from them, even though they have achieved cultural
heights within a Hobbesean tribal framework.
The rabbinic concept of society, however, is not Hobbesean. How, then, do the rabbis
escape the contradictions of the Social Contract theory of the origins of morality? The
answer is that the rabbis do not regard either of their two covenants (that of the Seven
Laws and that of the Torah) as actually creating morality. On the contrary, both
covenants were offered to already functioning moral persons or communities.
The rabbinic conception is that human beings possess moral faculties naturally, but
that these faculties are somewhat weak and easily perverted, and require guidance in
order to function well. In other words, the moral life can be pursued only with the aid of
education. Education, however, on Kantian principles, is suspect; it may be only a
disguised form of indoctrination, which is inconsistent with free moral choice. How do
we strike a balance between brainwashing and culpable educational neglect? When does
education stop? Should it be confined to children, or should it continue into adulthood?
The rabbinic answer is that, for Jews at any rate, education never stops. In a sense,
the truly moral being never becomes an adult, because he/she is always in a learning
situation. This concept perhaps throws a new light on the saying of Jesus, ‘Unless you
become as little children, you will not enter the kingdom of Heaven.’ This may not mean
that (in Wordsworthian style) the child is the best philosopher and to educate him is only
to stunt his spontaneous reactions to Nature (‘one impulse from a vernal wood/ May
teach you more of man/Of moral evil or of good/ Than all the sages can’). It may mean,
on the contrary, that it is the incompleteness of the child, rather than its polymathy, that
is to be cultivated. At the same time, the linking of morality with education provides
teaching roles as well as learning ones; he who remains always a child makes the best
teacher6.
But what are we to make of the assertion in the above-quoted passage that ‘he who
performs what he is commanded is greater than he who performs what he has not been
commanded’? Is not this a formulation of the very essence of heteronomy? Only, it
appears to say, if we banish from our minds any thought of doing good for its own sake,
or because it forms part of a moral ideal which we have formulated for ourselves, can
we become truly deserving of reward; we must act only as obedient servants bowing
humbly to the behest of the Master. Does this finally refute the contention that the
commandments, in rabbinic thought, are moral guidelines, given to help the faltering
moral faculties of humanity towards articulation and fulfilment? Are they not rather fiats
from above cancelling human efforts to contribute moral insights to the functioning of
the community?
I do not think that this would be a fair reading of R. Hanina's principle, ‘He who
performs what he has been commanded is greater than he who performs what he has
not been commanded’. Note that this principle says nothing about reward, even though
it is cited in the Talmudic passage under discussion in a context of reward. The principle
itself is concerned with who is greater, that is, who is of higher moral stature. The
principle, I suggest, amounts to a claim that ordinary morality is superior to ‘saintly’ or
supererogatory morality — it is not a claim that obedience to God's power is the essence
of morality, which would indeed be heteronomy. The question is, ‘Which is greater, to do
the things one is bound to do, or to do the things which go beyond what one is bound to
do?’ The answer is not at all simple (some people being bound to do things not required
of others, and some kinds of obligation being different from others), but this is a real
question in morality, not just a surrender to ‘heteronomy’. It may be that this is one of
the fundamental differences between Judaism and Christianity, which seems to demand
a supererogatory standard as the essence of morality. The question of election is
involved here too, because election entails obligations with which the unelected are not
burdened. What if the unelected voluntarily assume them? Suppose, for example, a
Gentile voluntarily refrains from eating pork? He is not bound to do so, and thus some
might argue that his behaviour is all the more meritorious; but the Hanina principle says
that he is taking on an unnecessary obligation, a kind of moral luxury, which does not
compare in status with the abstention of those for whom the prohibition is a badge of
loyalty and dedication — even though the good intention behind such Gentile behaviour
deserves respect.
Similarly, a Jew may perform deeds that go beyond what the Torah requires (this is
called middat chasidim, see p. 110). An example is the man who, seeing someone about
to steal his goods, declared them ownerless (hefqer), in order to rescue the would-be
thief from sin. Such behaviour, from one standpoint, is the highest possible. Yet it
belongs to the sphere of moral virtuosity rather than to that of everyday community
behaviour, and so is regarded as almost a personal indulgence which is irrelevant to the
major project of creating a decent, kindly and viable society. A good society depends on
the general maintenance of a minimum moral standard, not on the virtuoso
performances of individual saints. A society which prizes moral virtuosity too much is
liable to be satisfied with a miserable standard of ordinary behaviour, since the
performances of the saints are regarded as unattainable by average persons, whose
efforts are inhibited and consoled by the feeling that their shortcomings are supplied
and compensated for by the saints.
The moral education of the ordinary people is the supreme value in rabbinic Judaism.
It is to this end that the rabbis developed the extraordinary system of preaching known
as ’aggadah, in which devices are used suitable for the understanding of the people. A
prominent example of this is the use of parables, by which a narrative attractiveness is
given to themes of repentance and charity. The passage cited in this chapter is another
kind of narrative device: a free exercise of imagination about the Day of Judgment, by
which thoughts about Covenant and Election can be conveyed. This narrative method is
the rabbinic way of doing philosophy; a method midway between mythopoeia and
discursive thought.
The conception of Torah as essentially education received its special stamp because of
the circumstances of revolution in which the Torah was born. Every revolution implies a
total rethinking of society, and this programme has to be taught. Here all the benefits
and pitfalls of education are involved. It was from the effort of grappling with
educational problems that the thought of both Bible and the rabbinic movement
received its chief impetus. The emphasis on universal education rescues Judaism from
élitism, and explains the suspicion it feels towards displays of moral virtuosity.
1
These unpublished remarks of Rousseau were preserved in the public library at
Neuschatel (Cahiers de brouillons, notes et extraits, no. 7843). A partial transcription
of the document is in I. Masson, La religion de Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Paris, 1916.
The whole document is transcribed in Poliakov (1975), vol. III, pp. 104–5.
2In contrast, Arthur Koestler, in his book The Thirteenth Tribe, argued that the Jews'
lack of racial purity was a refutation of their religious stance, which he misunderstood
to depend on a claim to racial purity. See my review of Koestler's book (Maccoby,
1977).
3Gellner (1995), pp. 65–66.
4Schapira was apparently unaware (Gellner too) that this difficulty was not overlooked
by the rabbis of the Talmud and Midrash, who explained (Gen. Rabbah 22) that Cain
and Abel were born with twin sisters, whom they married. This incest was permitted
by God in order to get the human race started. The incest of the daughters of Lot
(Gen. 19: 31–38) was also excused on the ground that they thought that they and their
father were the only survivors of a world catastrophe (Gen. Rabbah 51).
5See Gaston (1987). For discussion of Gaston's view, see Maccoby (1991), pp. 170–79.
6The rabbinic treatise that deals primarily with education is ‘Avot, which forms part of
the Mishnah.
 5
JUDAISM AND REVOLUTION

There is a great significance in the fact that the Judaic Social Contract (whether
regarded as historical or mythical) took place in circumstances of revolution. This, in a
large historical perspective, puts it in the category of the constitutional creativity of the
French and American revolutions, rather than in the peaceful legislation of Numa,
Lycurgus and Solon, cited by Rousseau. Moses was not a Solon, invited by a settled
community to provide them with an improved legal and political system. Moses was a
revolutionary in a sense even more radical than the founders of the French republic, the
United States or even the Soviet Union; for Moses was creating a new community and
designing a revolutionary state which did not yet have a territorial existence, based on a
population, the Israelites, without previous political experience or tradition except as
slaves (though with vague memories of a happier mode of life in the past). The blueprint
for statehood which is the Torah was conceived in the desert; a symbol of the vacuum
which precedes an entirely new start, unencumbered by precedent of any kind.
Perhaps the closest ancient analogy to the Mosaic revolution can be found in the story
of Spartacus, who led a slave revolution against the Roman state in 73 BCE. According
to one account, Spartacus intended to fight his way to the north where he planned to set
up an independent state based on new principles of freedom; but he failed to persuade
his army to leave Italy, where eventually he and they perished. Moses was a Spartacus
who did leave the country of the oppressors behind and persuaded his fellow-
revolutionaries (though with many difficulties) to aim at a political future in a new land.
The religion founded by Moses thus differed vitally from other ancient religions in not
claiming to be as old as time. It was an openly parvenu religion proclaiming its
revolutionary origins as a conscious breakaway from the old-established religions of
Egypt and Babylonia. This consciousness of radical discontinuity was also part of the
thinking of the rabbis and affected their conceptions of morality.
Of course, as in all revolutions, a continuity was claimed with a distant golden past
before the rise of tyranny. The age of the Patriarchs, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, served
this function in Israelite religion, and even before them, there were early patriarchs who
served the One God, even though they lacked the special covenantal status that was to
be provided by Sinai. In rabbinic tradition, Abraham has a double role: he provides an
otherwise rootless revolutionary community with a noble background and genealogy;
but he also validates their own revolutionary stance by his revolt against the religion of
his Chaldean father Terah. The Hebrew Bible actually tells us nothing about this, but the
Midrashic legends about how Abraham broke the works of his idol-making father, and
how he clashed with the tyrant Nimrod before going into exile from Babylonia, have
become so familiar that many Jews believe that they are actually in the Bible. Abraham's
journey from Babylonia to Canaan becomes a presage and model for the Israelites'
Exodus from Egypt.
The realisation of the revolutionary character of Israelite religion is a necessary
counter to the image fostered by Christian polemic of Judaism as a hidebound
reactionary authoritarian religion based on legal precedent and stifling ritual. The
pioneer of this approach is Michael Walzer, whose excellent book Exodus and Revolution
showed the parallels between the biblical story of the Exodus and the great
revolutionary cataclysms of history; and also showed, by documentary evidence (diaries,
letters, etc.) how the symbols of the Exodus (the Desert, the Mountain and the Promised
Land) inspired the leaders of the Puritan and the American Revolutions. Walzer showed
how the perennial problems of revolution are typified in the biblical account of the
troubles of Moses in the Desert (e.g. the mutiny of Korah, the Utopian, with his
objection to Moses' leadership on the ground that ‘all the congregation of the Lord are
holy’). Walzer, however, shows no realisation of how revolutionary themes continued into
later Judaism and can be traced in the Talmud and other rabbinic writings.
But before we investigate the revolutionary character of Judaism, in its rejection of
divine kingship, and divinely-descended aristocracy, and its startlingly egalitarian
notions of property and personal rights, it is necessary to confront a charge that might
seem to cut the ground beneath all the moral claims of Judaism: the appalling
indictment against the Israelites for their genocide of the Canaanites. How can we
respect the Covenant of the Desert as a model of moral dedication and a blueprint for a
pilot scheme in communal living (beside which Plato's Republic is mere dilettante
musings), if the first political act of the new community was to invade a highly-populated
area and massacre its inhabitants?
Here we may look at some biblical texts, and see how the rabbis dealt with them.
And he said, Behold, I make a covenant: before all thy people I will do marvels, such as have not been done in all
the earth, nor in any nation: and all the people among which thou art shall see the work of the Lord: for it is a
terrible thing that I will do with thee.
Observe thou that which I command thee this day: behold I drive out before thee the Amorite, and the
Canaanite, and the Hittite, and the Perizzite, and the Hivite and the Jebusite.
Take heed to thyself, lest thou make a covenant with the inhabitants of the land whither thou goest, lest it be for
a snare in the midst of thee;
But ye shall destroy their altars, break their images, and cut down their groves:
For thou shalt worship no other god: for the Lord, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God:
Lest thou make a covenant with the inhabitants of the land, and they go awhoring after their gods, and sacrifice
unto their gods, and one call thee, and thou eat of his sacrifice;
And thou take of their daughters unto thy sons, and their daughters go awhoring after their gods, and make thy
sons go awhoring after their gods.
(Exodus 34: 10–16).

And the Lord spake unto Moses in the plains of Moab by Jordan near Jericho, saying,
Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them, When ye are passed over Jordan into the land of Canaan;
Then ye shall drive out all the inhabitants of the land from before you, and destroy all their pictures, and
destroy all their molten images, and quite pluck down all their high places:
And ye shall dispossess the inhabitants of the land, and dwell therein: for I have given you the land to possess it.
(Numbers 33: 50–53)

When the Lord thy God shall bring thee into the land whither thou goest to possess it, and hath cast out many
nations before thee, the Hivites, and the Girgashites, and Amorites, and the Canaanites,and the Perizzites, and the
Hittites, and the Jebusites, seven nations greater and mightier than thou;
And when the Lord thy God shall deliver them before thee; thou shalt smite them, and utterly destroy them;
thou shalt make no covenant with them, nor show mercy unto them;
Neither shalt thou make marriages with them; thy daughter thou shalt not give unto his son, nor his daughter
shalt thou take unto thy son.
For they will turn away thy son from following me, that they may serve other gods; so will the anger of the Lord
be kindled against you and destroy thee suddenly
(Deuteronomy 7:1–5)

(See also Deuteronomy 20:10–18, Joshua 11: 10–20).

From the above passages, it is not at all clear that the Israelites were commanded to
carry out a genocide of the inhabitants of Canaan. From the Exodus passages we would
only conclude that the inhabitants were to be driven out, not killed, though of course
many would be killed in the course of being driven out (one passage, however, envisages
that they would be driven out, partly at any rate, by supernatural means without actual
fighting, see Deut. 7:70, Josh. 24:12).
In Joshua we do have a record of massacres of various cities, yet even in Joshua there
remains a remnant of a different picture, one of expulsion. ‘And I sent the hornet before
you, which drave them out from before you, even the two kings of the Amorites; but not
with thy sword, nor with thy bow’ (Joshua 24:12).
On the whole, the picture is one which we might characterise today as ‘ethnic
cleansing’, rather than genocide. The general aim was to clear the land of its
inhabitants, and this was achieved by a policy of massacre of chosen target cities,
leading to a mass exodus of the terrorised inhabitants to other lands. This would
account for the unravaged state of the land itself when the occupation was concluded:
‘And I have given you a land for which ye did not labour, and cities which ye built not,
and ye dwell in them; of the vineyards and the oliveyards which ye planted not do ye eat’
(Joshua 24:13).
There is yet another image in the biblical tradition accounting for, or describing, the
mass exodus of the Canaanites. This is the image of ‘vomiting’. After a list of sexual
offences, we have the following religio-historical statement: ‘Defile not ye yourselves in
any of these things: for in all these the nations are defiled which I cast out before you.
And the land is defiled: therefore I do visit the iniquity thereof upon it, and the land
itself vomiteth out her inhabitants’ (Leviticus 18:24–25).
According to this notion, the expulsion of the Canaanites was the result of their sins.
The invading Israelites were only the emetic instrument by which the land was enabled
to get rid of the nausea it felt against its inhabitants. The moral immediately drawn is
that the Israelites too will be vomited out if they do not provide a moral improvement on
the Canaanites. In this respect, the invasion of the Israelites differs widely from the
model of ‘ethnic cleansing’, which is based on a strong feeling of entitlement to the land
by reason of historical connection. In the Israelite invasion, the Israelites have no ethnic
entitlement to the land at all; they have never lived there as a nation. Even though their
ancestors Abraham, Isaac and Jacob did live there, they did so as ‘sojourners’, as is
emphasized by the story of Abraham's purchase of a plot of land from the Hittite
inhabitants for the burial of his wife Sarah (even though he had been promised by God
that his descendants would own the land one day, this did not give him any rights in the
present beyond those of a ‘sojourner’)1.
Thus the right of the Israelites to invade the Land is conceived in terms of morality
and dedication. The Land is no ordinary land. It is a holy land which will allow no
unworthy inhabitants to remain in it. It does not belong to its inhabitants but to God. If
the Israelites do not prove worthy, they will be ejected too; ‘ … for the land is mine; for
ye are strangers and sojourners with me’ (Leviticus 25:23). The status of Abraham as a
‘sojourner’ in the Land is to remain the status of his descendants even when they enter
the Land as a nation. This is a new concept of what it means to be a nation in a land.
In modern terms, the Israelites have a right to invade the Land because they are
initiating a revolution in human living. But why not invite the inhabitants, the
Canaanites, to join in this revolution? Why do they have to be driven out or killed? There
seem to be two answers to this: first, the Canaanites, on the whole, are too set in
established ways to join the revolution, and especially their patterns of power structure
made resistance inevitable. Secondly, the Canaanites, in some instances, did join the
revolution. We have the case of the Gibeonites, who made peace with the Israelites
(Joshua 9). This is represented as a trick, by which they pretended to be non-indigenous,
but once a treaty had been made with them, it had to be honoured, and the whole Hivite
tribe (to which the city of Gibeon belonged) was incorporated into the Israelite nation2.
There is the paradigm case of Rahab, who was protected by the Israelites because of the
help she gave to the invaders (Joshua 2). In rabbinic tradition, this Canaanite woman
was a convert to Judaism, who became the wife of Joshua, the Israelite leader, and
became the ancestress of eight prophets, including Jeremiah. Then there is the Kenite
tribe, which at one point is reckoned among the Canaanites. The Kenites not only joined
the invading Israelites but became one of their most important communities, revered for
their piety and their adherence to the Rechabite vow. Thus the picture of the
annihilation of the Canaanites, derived from certain verses, is contradicted by others.
The Canaanites survived as a component of the Israelite people; Jews, a people of very
mixed blood, are thus partly descended from the Canaanites.
All in all, we have a composite picture of an invasion which had varying results on the
indigenous inhabitants of the country. Some were killed, some were expelled, and some
were incorporated into the new polity set up by the invaders. There is thus much
justification in the biblical text for the rabbinic view of the choice put by Joshua to the
Canaanites whenever he besieged a city: ‘Whosoever desires to go, let him go; and
whosoever desires to make peace, let him make peace; and whosoever desires to make
war, let him do so. The Girgashites departed, and so were given a land as good as their
own … Africa [Carthage]. The Gibeonites made peace. The 31 kings waged war and
were defeated’ (Deut. R. 5:14; Lev. R. 17:6)3.
The rabbis further backed up their picture of Joshua's offer of peace to the Canaanites
by their interpretation of a biblical passage: (Deut. 20:10): ‘When thou comest nigh unto
a city to fight against it, then proclaim peace unto it. And it shall be, if it make thee
answer of peace, and open unto thee, then it shall be, that all the people that is found
therein shall be tributaries unto thee and they shall serve thee.’ The rabbis interpret
that this refers also to cities of the Canaanites (Sifre on Deut. 20.10).4, even though, in
context, it appears to apply only to non-Canaanite cities (see Deut. 20:15). The
injunction to destroy Canaanite cities applies only if they are obdurate in defying the
new régime.
Though there are justifications in the contradictions of the text for the rabbis'
interpretation that peace was to be offered to all Canaanites, it cannot be denied that
some texts in Deuteronomy and Joshua (though not in Exodus) breathe the spirit of
genocide. Historically, this is due to the circumstances in which these passages were
written (long after the events described); the apostasy to idolatry of many Israelites
under Menasseh and the subsequent zealot reforms of Josiah, produced an extremism in
which the fancied extirpation of the Canaanites acted as a model, and the evidence for
comparative moderation in the conduct of the invasion was overlooked.
Historically, the wholesale massacres described did not occur, as is shown by the
scriptural evidence of the survival of Canaanite cities and tribes (as well as by
archaeological evidence). For example, even in the time of David, over four hundred
years after the Invasion, the area of Jerusalem was still occupied by a Canaanite tribe,
the Jebusites (see Josh. 15:63). David is equivocally said to have conquered the Jebusites
finally (II Sam. 5:7), but more probably he made a treaty with them by which their
presence and influence in Jerusalem was continued; they may even have taken part in
the administration of the Temple built by David's son Solomon5.
Even those biblical verses that can be characterized as ‘genocidal’ are not so in the
modern sense of the term, since they are not racialists. The reason given for the
elimination of the Canaanites (whether by expulsion or by massacre) is always the same;
their idolatry, which must not be allowed to infect their conquerors. ‘But thou shalt
utterly destroy them; namely, the Hittites, and the Amorites, the Canaanites, and the
Perizzites, the Hivites and the Jebusites; as the Lord thy God hath commanded thee; that
they teach you not to do after all their abominations, which they have done unto their
gods; so should you sin against the Lord your God’ (Deut. 20:17–18). The aim is to put a
new form of society into place, and, like all revolutionaries, the Israelites are concerned
not to be corrupted by the old ways. This is the root of revolutionary violence, which, in
its most intransigent and merciless form, led Stalin to eliminate the kulaks, and Pol Pot
to eliminate the teachers and intellectuals of Cambodia, but which can also take much
less extreme forms. Those who are steeped in the old ways of thinking must somehow be
got rid of, or at least radically re-educated where this is possible, or the new society will
turn out to be a carbon-copy of the old.
The moral question here is how far, and under what conditions, revolutionary violence
can be approved. The first and most important consideration is that under conditions of
total oppression, violence in the cause of freedom is essential and inevitable. The
oppression practised by a totalitarian government is itself violent, and expresses itself in
violence of every kind, including imprisonment, torture, crucifixion, beheading. To fight
against such a régime is not merely morally permissible, but a moral duty.
The Israelites, however, were fighting not as citizens of Canaan against an oppressive
government, but as invaders from the desert. What moral right did they have to wage
aggressive war against a nation settled in its own land? Here the principle of inviolable
national identity might be invoked, by which imperialism is condemned.
The Israelites could hardly be called imperialists, since they had no land of their own
which they wished to expand into an empire. They were a band of escaped slaves, who
had developed a concept of a state based on freedom, like Spartacus. The whole slave-
owning world was against them; slave-owning states were all pledged to return escaped
slaves to their masters6. For the Israelites, the world was divided into two categories,
slave-owners and slaves; national divisions were far less important to them. The system
was thus more like the feudal system of medieval Europe than like the later European
system in which national identities became important. The fight of the Israelites against
the Canaanites was what Marx would have called a class war. The Israelites were
fighting not just for themselves and their own national identity (a very recent creation)
but for slaves everywhere. Their fight should be likened to the Peasants' Revolt in
England under Wat Tyler, or the similar Peasants' Revolt in Germany (which Luther
condemned in the name of the New Testament and Paul's dictum, ‘The powers that be
are ordained of God’).
On the other hand, the Israelites cannot exactly be likened to the Arabs, who under
the successors of Muhammad, swept out of the desert to invade adjacent lands in the
name of a new religion. Here too the conquered peoples were given a choice: convert to
Islam or die (the third of Joshua's offered choices, to vacate the land, was not on offer by
the Muslims, though they did allow subject status to Jews and Christians, judged to be
non-idolaters, but of an inferior kind). But the Arabs already had a land and a long
history of living in it; their religion was new, but not their nationhood. Further, the Arabs
were not intent on conquering just one holy land as the Israelites were. The Muslim plan
of conquest was unlimited; like Christianity, Islam aimed to take over the whole world.
It is hard to think of a parallel to the revolutionary position of the Israelites; a nation
formed in the desert, but (contrary to the assertion of antisemites such as Werner
Sombart) refusing to accept the nomadic values of the desert (even Mount Sinai, the
scene of the revelation, was never made into a Holy Place), but on the contrary building
up an ideal picture of an agricultural community which they were determined to
implement by clearing an area for their new experiment in living. There is something of
a parallel here to the decision made by the Russian revolutionaries, when, after long
debate, they decided to give up the aim of world conquest and ‘build Socialism in one
land’. Like the Israelites, the Russian revolutionaries were opposed to the master-class
in every land; but like them, they realised that a diffused world-wide revolution was not
likely to succeed, and they would be better advised to build the new society on their own
doorstep - though unlike the Israelites, they did have a doorstep.
The final justification for revolution violence, however, is always the outcome. If a
revolution achieves nothing radically new, but instead relapses into a tyranny
indistinguishable from what it was designed to overthrow, its initial violence becomes
retrospectively evil. The Mosaic revolution resulted in the Mosaic polity governed by a
new social philosophy. The constitutional monarchy, the welfare state, the forgiving of
debts and the periodic restoration of land-ownership — all these are the true
justification of the founding violence. How did these values and perspectives perpetuate
themselves in later Jewish history, and how did they form of the pattern of the rabbinic
philosophy?
1
There is an interesting attempt by the medieval commentator Rashi to claim an ethnic
right to the Land. This is a comment on the verse, ‘The Canaanite was then in the
land’ (Genesis 12:6). ‘The land had belonged previously to the descendants of Shem,
and the Canaanites entered in the time of Abraham and had thus occupied the land for
only a limited time before the Israelite invasion began.’ As descendants of Shem,
therefore, the Israelites had more ethnic right to the Land than the Canaanites, who
were descendants of Ham! The more sceptical medieval commentator Ibn Ezra,
however, saw the verse as presenting a problem for the authorship of Genesis by
Moses, since the verse seems to be written from the standpoint of a time when the
Canaanites were no longer in the land. Rashi, however, contends that the word ‘then’
means ‘then but not earlier’ (not ‘then but not later’). His view is not derived from any
Talmudic or Midrashic source.
2Why, then, did the Gibeonites feel it necessary to use deceit (pretending to have come
from a far country), if they had before them Joshua's offer to accept those who wished
to make peace? The rabbinic answer to this problem (which really arises from the lack
of consistency in the biblical account — i.e. the intrusion of the genocidal trend into an
account of peace-making), is that Joshua set a timetable for acceptance, and the
Gibeonites, having delayed in order to assess the Israelites' military power,
overstepped the deadline, and thus were forced to adopt a deception (see Deut. R.
5:14, Lev. R. 17:6, j. Shev. 7, 36c; Ginzberg IV. p. 9).
3
There is no mention here of the Kenites, who were regarded as having become allies of
the Israelites even before the invasion of Canaan. See I Sam. 15:6.
4This is Maimonides' understanding of the Sifre's comment. Other commentators,
however, understand the Sifre to say that only Canaanites found within a non-
Canaanite city should be spared. A more unequivocal version of the matter is found in
Deut. R. 5:14, where God is represented as saying to Moses, ‘Every war you wage
shall be preceded by an offer of peace’; Joshua is here represented as merely following
this earlier divine command.
5
The account of the co-operation of Araunah the Jebusite is revealing. The somewhat
shamed consciousness of Jebusite participation in Temple origins (it has even been
argued that the first Temple High Priest, Zadok, was a Jebusite) may be reflected in
the prophecy of Zechariah, ‘In that day there shall be no more the Canaanite in the
house of the Lord of Hosts’ (Zech. 14:21), though this could also refer to the nethinim,
the Temple servants alleged to be descendants of the Gibeonites.
6It is significant that the Torah explicitly dissociates itself from the slave-owners' pact to
return escaped slaves to each other: ‘Thou shalt not deliver unto his master the
servant (i.e. slave) which is escaped from his master unto thee. He shall dwell with
thee, even among you, in that place which he shall choose in one of thy gates, where it
liketh him best; thou shalt not oppress him’ (Deut.23:15–16). For the opposite practice
of non-Israelites, see I Kings 2:39.
 6
REVOLUTIONARY THOUGHT IN
RABBINIC WRITINGS

An important reason why people do not think of the rabbinic movement as revolutionary
is the New Testament portrayal of the Pharisees as reactionary, authoritarian figures,
the very image of the Catholic dignitaries against whom Voltaire waged his war against
‘l’infame'. Influenced by this pervasive portrayal, even Jews tend to think of Jesus as a
reformer who pitted himself against the rabbinic Establishment of his day. The fact that
Jesus was addressed by his followers and others as ‘Rabbi’ might have alerted readers
of the New Testament to the fact that Jesus was a member of the rabbinic movement,
rather than its opponent. The negative NT picture of the Pharisees is part of the Gospel-
writers' campaign to blame the death of Jesus on the Jews and their religious leaders the
Pharisees instead of on the Romans and their appointed quislings the High Priest and
the Sadducees1. The Gospels, written for Gentile converts to Pauline Christianity (who
had no interest in supporting Jewish claims to national independence), are pro-Roman
and anti-Jewish. Their message to the Romans is: ‘Do not persecute us as adherents of a
rebellious Jew. True, Jesus died on a Roman cross, just like so many Jewish rebels. But
he was innocent of the sedition of which he was accused. Even the Roman governor,
Pilate, did not want to execute him, and even the centurion in charge of the crucifixion
acknowledged his divinity. It was the Jews, especially their religious leaders the
Pharisees, who wanted Jesus dead because of his rebellion against their religious
authority; it was they who falsely denounced him on a political charge to get rid of him.’
This ploy involves blackening the Pharisees as hypocrites (a charge usually made
against opponents who appear blameless) and oppressors. Even the Gospels, however,
cannot keep up this charge (which has had a decisive influence on the course of
Christian anti-semitism). Inconsistent passages of praise of the Pharisees appear
occasionally even in the New Testament (surviving from the records of the Jerusalem
Church, which was pro-Pharisee). For example, the author of the book of Acts reveals
that Gamaliel, a Pharisee, who was ‘respected by all the people’, rescued Peter and his
companions from the attempt by the High Priest, at a meeting of the Sanhedrin, to have
them executed (Acts 5). Actually, Gamaliel, as we know from the rabbinic writings, was
not just ‘a Pharisee’, but the leader of the whole Pharisee movement. The Synoptic
Gospels give fictitious accounts of the trial of Jesus before the Sanhedrin, whereas the
Fourth Gospel reveals that there was no such trial, and Jesus was merely interrogated
by the High Priest's father-in-law Annas ‘in his house’ before being handed over to the
Romans. If Jesus had appeared before the Sanhedrin, Gamaliel, the leader of the
Pharisees, would have spoken in his favour, just as he did in the subsequent case of
Peter.
A much more accurate picture of the Pharisees can be gleaned from the writings of
Josephus, though he cannot be said to have been wholeheartedly in their favour.
Sometimes he gives them his grudging admiration, but at other times he describes them
indignantly as a thorn in the flesh of the Establishment. He says that they were ‘in the
habit of opposing kings’, and describes how they refused King Herod's request that they
should take an oath of allegiance to Rome, and as a consequence, Herod massacred
their leaders (Antiquities, xvii. 2, 42–44). The Pharisees regarded themselves as the
heirs of the Hebrew Prophets, who acted as critics of the kings of Judah and Israel, as
when Nathan rebuked David, and Elijah rebuked Ahab. Similarly, the Pharisees rebuked
the Hasmonean kings for contravening the ancient Jewish separation of powers (the
Hasmoneans had illegally combined the roles of king and High Priest), and suffered
massacre under Alexander Jannaeus (see Babylonian Talmud, Kiddushin 66a)2. Not a
breath of this history of resistance to political authority is allowed to enter the New
Testament descriptions of the Pharisees.
The Hebrew prophets, whenever they protested against abuses perpetrated by the
king or by the wealthy, appealed to the spirit of the Exodus, urging remembrance of the
release from slavery and oppression that formed the origin of the Israelite nation.
Similarly, the Pharisees, and their successors the Rabbis, were always mindful of the
release from slavery, or revolution, that was the foundation of Judaism. For example, the
third-century teacher Abba Arika (known as Rav), when asked for biblical proof of the
right of workers to withdraw their labour at any time, replied, ‘The proof is in the verse,
“For unto Me the children of Israel are slaves” (Lev. 25:55). This means that they shall
not be slaves to any human being’ (b. Bava Metzia 10a). The verse quoted refers, in
context, to the institution of the Jubilee year of freedom for bondsmen (i.e. Israelites
sold into temporary bondage for the payment of debts). When God released the
Israelites from bondage to Egypt, they came into bondage to Him. This in effect meant
release from human bondage for ever, and thus the abolition of the god-given rights
enjoyed in other cultures by kings, aristocracies, priests, wealthy landowners and
employers.
This concept of equality and freedom is certainly not quite the same as that projected
by modern theories of democracy. Also, it is a little difficult to reconcile Rav's
enunciation of freedom as stemming from slavery to God with the theories of Covenant
or contract also constantly found in rabbinic thought, in which the Israelites freely
accepted the Torah offered to them by God, rather than accepting a new yoke of slavery
in gratitude for their deliverance from the Egyptians. Moreover, it may be objected that
the idea that freedom from slavery to humans depends on slavery to God guarantees the
freedom of Israelites, but not of non-Israelites, who do not have a history of Exodus and
deliverance3. If God rescued the Israelites from slavery, and thereby became their sole
Master, does this mean that other slaves everywhere, whom God has not delivered, must
reconcile themselves to their slave-status? What argument could one use, for example,
to prove that non-Israelites have the right to withdraw their labour at any time?
It seems clear that there is no proposal in the Hebrew Bible to abolish slavery
worldwide, but only to abolish it within the new revolutionary polity of Israel. Even here
it is abolished only for Israelites themselves, not for non-Israelites, whom Israelites are
permitted to own as slaves. An Israelite who, under pressure of debts, sells himself as a
bondsman must be released after seven years, or at the Jubilee, whichever comes first.
A non-Israelite who becomes an Israelite's slave is not released at the Jubilee. But he
does have some important rights and privileges which mark him out from the slaves in
other nations of the ancient world. His master has no right to kill him, and if he does
must suffer capital punishment. Even more extraordinarily, if an Israelite master injures
a non-Israelite slave, even to the extent of knocking out a tooth, he must give him
immediate freedom. This alone is an enormous differentiation, for in other nations,
slaves are not human beings at all, and may be disposed of for economic reasons: in
Rome, sick slaves were exposed on the island of Aesculapius in the Tiber and left to die4.
As for injuries, in Babylonian, Greek and Roman law, a master has the right to inflict
these at any time. Aristotle had already given a rationale for such conduct when he
classed slaves as sub-human, especially when they belonged to non-Greek nations
(Politics, 1255a)5.
Further, a slave, in Israelite law, has the right to rest on Sabbaths and festivals. To be
sure, he shares this right with animals, but consideration for animals, to the point of
providing them with rest-periods, also had no place in the thought of non-Israelite
ancient nations. A reason is given for this consideration for slaves: ‘Remember that you
were slaves in the land of Egypt’ (Deut. 5:15). Even though slavery was not abolished by
the Torah, the Israelite experience of slavery made it impossible to think of slaves as
naturally inferior, and slavery in Israel became a radically different institution. The way
was thus paved for its eventual abolition.
What the Torah abolished immediately was slavery for Israelites. To be an Israelite
was automatically to be a free person. The Torah was a constitution of freedom. Even a
king could not turn the humblest Israelite into a slave. This was such a breathtaking
innovation that to generalise it to the whole of mankind did not seem possible at this
stage. It was part of the Utopian aspect of the Torah, by which it created institutions far
in advance of the rest of humanity, in a daring, difficult pilot-project into which the
Chosen People (not chosen for any already-existent virtue on their part) had to be slowly
educated6.
Thus the abolition of slavery for Israelites must be regarded as part of that aspect of
the Torah which demanded of Israelites a new, higher standard not required of non-
Israelites, and therefore not part of basic human morality. For example, the Torah
demands that Israelites must not charge interest on any loans between themselves; they
are permitted, however, to charge or pay interest on loans between Israelites and non-
Israelites. Charging interest on loans was not regarded as intrinsically evil (contrary to
the thought of Aristotle and of the Christian Church), but as a permissible activity in the
world at large as a way of financing business enterprises. Israelites, however, must
regard themselves as having a family-love towards each other that precluded normal
business ethics; a loan must be regarded as an act of love by which one Israelite helps
another in financial need7. The Israelite nation was to be a dedicated group practising
within its own community a special ethic. The law of the Seventh Year (shemittah) when
all debts were to be remitted, and the Law of the Jubilee when alienated land was to be
returned to its first owner (and when bondsmen were to be freed) were part of this
Utopian ideal.
This concept of a special ethic raises problems for the theory of morality. How does it
square with the determination of Israelite religion to shunt saintliness into the sidelines,
and concentrate on the morality of the ordinary person (see p. 110 )? If the Nazirite has
been made into a peripheral figure, why does the Torah insist that Utopian institutions,
such as the Jubilee, must be observed by all Israelites, even though they are not
required of non-Israelites? Does this make the Israelites into a moral élite, who have
despaired of the fostering of moral norms outside their own community? Have the
Israelites retired into a moral retreat, monastery or ghetto, giving up the rest of the
world as lost? In particular, does the Torah regard the abolition of slavery as an
impossible ideal for mankind as a whole, with the conclusion that the liberation of slaves
should be restricted to one small community? Or does this restriction mean that the
Torah does not regard slavery as a moral evil at all (just as it does not regard usury as
an evil in a general, Kantian sense) but merely as a condition too humiliating for the
Chosen People?
I think that the constant repetition of the injunction, ‘Remember that you were slaves
in Egypt…’ and the exaltation of freedom itself as a value and ideal (‘I am the Lord your
God, who brought you forth out of the land of Egypt that you should not be their slaves;
and I have broken the bands of your yoke and made you go upright’ Lev. 26:13) rules out
the idea (proposed by Aristotle) that slavery is the inevitable lot for the great majority or
at least a large minority of mankind, who, by their natural baseness, deserve nothing
better. Slavery is always regarded in Jewish sources as an evil to which no-one is
naturally destined; there is nothing in either the Hebrew Bible or the rabbinic writings
similar to Paul's injunction to slaves to bear their lot with resignation, since physical
slavery is a trivial matter when one is in a state of spiritual freedom. Anyone who
voluntarily chooses slavery is regarded with contempt: the Israelites in the Wilderness
who yearn for the fleshpots of Egypt are wretches who are afraid of the responsibilities
of freedom; the Hebrew slave who chooses to remain with his master instead of
accepting his Jubilee liberty has his ear pierced as a sign of his despicable choice. One
of the daily blessings instituted by the rabbis is ‘Blessed art Thou O Lord … who did not
make me a slave.’
Certain features of biblical and rabbinic morality could be characterized as ‘messianic-
anticipatory’. They form a way of living appropriate to a messianic era regarded as far
ahead. Such a way of living is impossible for the mass of mankind in the present,
because of restrictive economic or social conditions8; but it is possible and mandatory
for an anticipatory community to embark on this way of life now, so that mankind can
send an expedition into the future.
Some of the laws of the Torah, especially in their rabbinic interpretation, are of this
kind. A conspicuous example is the institution of the Sabbath, derided by Hellenistic
antisemites as indicating the ‘laziness’ of the Jews. The rabbis saw the Sabbath as an
anticipation of the Messianic age, ‘the day that is all Sabbath’. The rabbinic attitude to
work was complex, but one strand in it, at least, regarded work as ‘the curse of Adam’,
which a new age reinstituting the glory of Eden would abolish. Karl Marx too foresaw an
era when work, in its grinding, servile aspect, would be abolished, though it would be
confirmed and glorified in its connotation as craftsmanship and art. The advent of
power-machines made such a vision possible, even though their first result was, on the
contrary, the substitution of deadening machine-minding for craftsmanship. Marx saw
beyond this to a time when machines would relieve the whole of mankind (not just a
privileged part of it) from soul-destroying labour and release it for truly productive work
i.e. art. It might be thought that the rabbis valued not art but study as the messianic
pursuit par excellence; yet there must be messianic significance in the rabbinic dictum
that there is a link between the Sabbath and the building of the Tabernacle in the
Wilderness. The Tabernacle was to the rabbis the apex of artistic achievement; its
creator, Bezalel, was endowed with the holy spirit, and he has become the patron saint
of Jewish art9.
Revolutionaries are also Messianists. By breaking their bonds, they also break the
mould. Instead of an ideal of a static society, endlessly repeating its pattern (the ‘Asiatic
society’), a dynamic model appears, capable of change, and thus inevitably adumbrating
a culmination in which the potentialities of humanity will be fulfilled. There is a paradox
here, since apparently such a culmination would be itself static; but this is an illusion,
since what is really meant is that in the Messianic age, change would become, for the
first time, meaningful and substantial, not a mere shifting of inessentials. As Marx put it,
in the classless society ‘true history will begin’. The rabbis put it in their own way:
‘There is no rest for the disciples of the wise, either in this world or in the World to
Come’ (b. Berakhot 64a).
It should be remembered that Judaism was an innovatory, indeed parvenu religion,
which boldly set itself against other religions which claimed awesome antiquity. The
abolition of the practice of magic (as Mary Douglas has pointed out10) was one of the
most significant of the Israelite advances, releasing the Israelite community from the
domination of magic-fear and the subservience to those who claimed power over
demons. The insistence that only the One God has power destroyed at a blow the beliefs
that held the people in thrall to charlatans. Judaism was attacked in the ancient world as
atheistic, and this charge, in a sense, was true, because Judaism was an emancipation
from a society full of gods and demons and an assertion of human independence. Even
where Judaism apparently adopted practices similar to those of other religions (e.g.
purity regulations) it gave them a new meaning. Purification was no longer a magic
practice for the repulsion of demons, but a system of etiquette preparing for entry into
the Temple11. It was too much to expect the rest of humanity to break its bonds to the
supernatural in this daring way, and so Judaism had to regard itself as a religion of
pioneers.
The special contribution of Judaism to the theory of morals is thus an outcome of the
revolutionary nature of Judaism itself. A morality of vocation and dedication is
adumbrated, rather than a Kantian model of equality or identity between all moral
beings. In various ways, Judaism proposes an interim or experimental morality, by which
a dedicated group of humanity strikes out in an unprecedented direction, not expecting
the whole of humanity to follow, except in some remote future. The Israelites, unformed
and backward as they are, are required to constitute a priest-nation, whose task will be
to explore a form of communal living for which the masses of humanity are not yet
ready; the Israelites, too, are not really ready for it, but are dragooned and cajoled into
making the experiment. While the nation as a whole is to adopt the higher morality,
exceptional spiritual adventuring on an individual basis is not exactly discouraged but
made marginal within the priest-nation; the Nazirites are not spiritual leaders, but
licensed eccentrics. The significant and central form of dedication is undertaken by the
community as a whole in its role as Chosen People. Advances not shared by the entire
community are beside the point, since the revolution is about communal living — how to
have a community based on love of neighbour, without idolatry of leaders or oppression
of a disprivileged class.
 Yet even within the Chosen People, a damper has to be put on ill-judged, premature
Utopianism. The present age, even though an age of revolution, is not yet the age of the
Messiah. This is the meaning of the rebellion of Korah in the Wilderness, and its
suppression by Moses. Korah, a fiery revolutionary, turned against the leaders of the
revolution, Moses and Aaron, and asked the fundamental question (which has always
troubled revolutionaries), ‘Is it consistent with the ideals of revolution to have leaders at
all?’ Koran's cry to Moses was, ‘All the congregation of the Lord are holy, so why should
you lord it over us?’ (Numbers 16:3). Koran's demand is that of the anarchists who
demurred against the lordship of Lenin; and Lenin did not deny the validity of the
anarchist demand, but only postponed its fulfilment to the time in the future when the
dictatorship of the proletariat would be dissolved, its enemies overcome, its task
fulfilled. Moses himself did not reject Korah's demand; his response to it was to fall on
his face. The ruthless suppression of Korah's Utopian revolt was carried out by God, or
as Lenin might have put it, by historical necessity. When Moses was told that Eldad and
Medad were ‘prophesying within the camp’, and the zealous apparatchik Joshua asked if
he should suppress this unauthorised outbreak of inspiration, Moses answered, ‘Would
God that all the people of the Lord were prophets’ (Numbers 11:29). This answer of
Moses expresses both aspiration and regret; he longs for the expansion of prophecy to
the whole people while regretting that this, at present, is an impossible ideal. In
Messianic times, all would become prophets, but in pre-Messianic times, there is a need
for leadership and government even in a revolutionary community; meanwhile, some
Messianic anarchist behaviour can be tolerated provided it does not escalate into
insurrection against the revolutionary leadership, which however interim and lacking in
perfection is indispensable in the first stage of implementation of the new ideas.
It may be objected, however, that the concept of the Chosen People is too exclusivist
to be regarded in this way as a pilot project for the whole of mankind. One recent book,
by Dan Jacobson, indicted the whole Israelite project as an elitist forerunner of Nazi
racism12. According to this author, the doctrine of the Chosen People is at the heart of
Judaism, both in its biblical and its rabbinic formulations. The Bible, on this view, is
indifferent to the fate of non-Jews, who are ruled out as unchosen and unimportant. The
moral scheme of Judaism is simply a badge of superiority or chosenness, by the
observance of which the Jewish community can maintain its privileged position.
Two books in the Bible are sufficient to refute this charge: Jonah and Job. In Jonah, a
Jewish prophet is commanded by God to go to a non-Jewish city, Nineveh, where he is to
preach repentance and prophesy doom. Jonah tries to evade this mission, but in the end
is forced to undertake it. As he fears, the inhabitants of Nineveh heed his warnings and
repent; he is made to look a fool, but they are saved.
In the book of Job, a non-Jew is declared to be a good and pious person. God accedes
to the request of Satan that Job should be tested. Job suffers numerous calamities,
confers with his friends (non-Jewish also) on the problem of evil, and in the end is
vouchsafed a reconciling vision of God. Nowhere in this book is there any mention of
specifically Jewish themes such as the revelation on Mount Sinai or the Temple.
It was a Jewish decision to include these two books in the canon of the Bible. In fact,
in a sense, the whole of the Bible is a rabbinic creation, because it was entirely a matter
of rabbinic decision what to include in the canon and what to exclude. Why were these
two books included, though they glorify non-Jews, if the Jews, as Jacobson argues, were
concerned only about their status as the Chosen People?
A rabbinic comment on Jonah is that he was reluctant to go to Nineveh out of patriotic
motives. He thought that the Ninevites were likely to repent, and this would show up the
Israelites who would lose God's favour. (The rabbis indeed comment that the Jonah
incident proves that non-Jews are more inclined to repentance than Jews, Mekhilta,
Pischa, Bo, 1). This was a narrow motive, certainly, but the point is that it is condemned.
On the contrary, it is a frequent rabbinic theme that Gentiles often act as a spur to Jews
by displaying conduct that Jews are supposed, but often fail, to display. For example,
there is the rabbinic story (b. Qiddushin 31a, y. Peah 1:15c) of the idolater, Dama ben
Netinah of Ashkelon, who acted as a model of how to fulfil the command to honour one's
parents — a command which was not even included in the Seven Commandments
incumbent on non-Jews. Thus Dama ben Netina (who would not disturb his father's sleep
to retrieve a jewel for which the Jewish elders offered an escalating sum) was the
supreme exemplar of a value mandatory for Jews but only supererogatory for him. This
mode of moral exhortation, by which Jews are shamed by the superior example of
Gentiles, is found in the Bible too (Malachi 1:11).
Rabbinic commentary on Job is that he was one of the seven great non-Jewish
prophets (of whom the greatest was Balaam, called in one rabbinic passage ‘a greater
prophet than Moses’, Sifrei on Deut., 34:10).
The concept of the Chosen People, then, is not one of superiority, but of dedication. It
is a mission which the Israelites are continually failing to implement, and for which they
require continual exhortation and criticism, pointing out how far short they have fallen
of fulfilling their task. Their position, so far from being privileged, is unenviable: ‘as a
father chasteneth his son, so the Lord thy God chasteneth thee (Deut. 8:5).’ As the
instrument of revolution, the Israelites are marked down for tribulation and are
sustained not by the present, but by the future.
But what about the emphasis on ‘holiness’? Does not this mark out the Israelites as
aloof and detached from earthly concerns, more like an order of monks than like a
vanguard of revolutionaries? The detailed Holiness code of Leviticus and its rabbinic
counterpart, the Order of Purities in the Mishnah, provide for a regimen of purity-
observances that seems more appropriate for priestly or monastic than for revolutionary
status.
Again, the Christian-Jewish conflict has distorted attitudes on this issue. Jesus,
wrongly portrayed as an opponent of the Holiness Code, has been represented as
abolishing the ritual aspect of Judaism, not, indeed, in favour of political and social
radicalism (since Jesus is portrayed in the gospels as indifferent to politics), but in
favour of a non-ritualistic moralism. In the course of this Christian polemic, the function
in Judaism of ritualism and especially ritual purity has been much exaggerated.
At the heart of the Holiness Code of Leviticus is the injunction, ‘Thou shalt love thy
neighbour like thyself13.’ This indicates that the Holiness Code, in the last resort, has a
moral purpose, rather than taking the place of morality. While the Holiness Code is
obligatory only for Jews (not for Gentiles, whose obligations outlined in the Seven Laws
do not include any dietary or purity restrictions), the purpose of the Code is to heighten
the Israelite sense of mission and thus preserve the separate identity of the Israelites as
a pioneer group working for the future of mankind.
The Holiness Code consists mainly of a dietary system, by which certain animals are
forbidden for food, and a purity system, by which certain states of the body
(menstruation, emission of semen, leprosy) and certain contacts (with dead bodies, with
persons not yet purified from the above) disqualify a person from entering the Temple or
from eating holy foodstuffs unless first purified by immersion in water or other means.
There is no obligation to be in a continual state of ritual purity, and, in general,
Israelites were expected to undergo purification only when about to enter the Temple at
one of the three Pilgrim Festivals. There is no permanently unclean caste, as in
Hinduism, for which purification procedures are ineffective.
The Holiness Code (much of which went out of practice when the Temple was
destroyed by the Romans, without in any way affecting the essence of Judaism), is the
Rule (in Catholic monastic terminology) of a dedicated group (or ‘Order’), by which it is
reminded of the special task for which it needs to preserve and foster its special identity.
Of course, there is always the danger in any such dedicated group of mistaking the
badge for the reality; this is the danger against which the prophets are continually
warning and which Jesus echoed when he reminded his fellow-Jews of the ‘weightier
matters of the Law, judgment, mercy and faith’.
In rabbinic Judaism, there are many legal decisions showing the inferior moral status
of ritual whenever it comes into conflict with basic moral demands. For example,
whenever there is danger to human life, all ritual requirements fall into abeyance, since
they are overridden by the moral duty of preserving life. This is not a question of
adopting the ‘lesser evil’; on the contrary, on such occasions it is a clear moral duty to
flout the ritual requirements, and there is no residue of disobedience or transgression in
such an act. In order to stress this point, the rabbis enacted that in circumstances where
a breach of ritual law was necessary (e.g. when a dangerous fire needs to be put out on
the Sabbath), the breach should be enacted by the most respected person present, i.e. a
rabbi, and should not be deputed to some unimportant person or a minor14 (b. Yoma
84b).
The above discussions point to the conclusion that in Judaism there is a concept or
theory of a many-levelled morality. Different people or groups or communities, in
different circumstances or at different stages of human development, have different
duties or obligations or voluntary moral undertakings. This is not the same as a moral
relativism, but it is also not the same as a single-levelled Kantian morality. This is a
matter that deserves discussion in a more discursive and philosophically-oriented style.
1The High Priest, the leader of the Sadducee party, was appointed to his position by the
Romans. During the reign of King Herod I, the High Priest had been appointed by the
king, who set aside certain priestly families, subservient to him, from whom the High
Priest was chosen. This system was continued under Roman rule, who thus ensured
that the High Priest was always loyal and subservient to Rome (see Josephus,
Antiquities, xx.10, 249).
2The Talmud (b. Sanhedrin 14a) tells the story of the Pharisee leader, Simeon ben
Shetach, who summoned King Yannai to court to attend the trial of his servant for
murder. The king complied and took his seat in court, but was ordered by Simeon to
stand up to give evidence. Whether or not the story is historically true, it gives an
indication of the self-image of the Pharisees.
3Itis perhaps to counter this deduction that one prophet, Jeremiah, attributes a future
history of Exodus and liberation to other nations in addition to Israel (see Jeremiah
48:47, 49:6,39, prophecies concerning Moab, Ammon and Elam, Ezekiel 29:14,
prophecy concerning Egypt). See also Isaiah 19:24, ‘In that day shall Israel be the
third with Egypt and with Assyria, even a blessing in the midst of the land; whom the
Lord of hosts shall bless, saying, Blessed be Egypt my people, and Assyria the work of
my hands, and Israel mine inheritance.’
4By a humane enactment of the Emperor Claudius, if such a slave recovered and
survived, his master could not resume ownership of him.
5A more charitable interpretation of Aristotle's meaning is that only inferior people
should be made into slaves, the term ‘inferior people’ referring particularly to non-
Greeks; but Aristotle accepted that this did not always happen, and many actual slaves
were not inferior.
6In the rabbinic writings, the Torah is constantly characterized as a charter of freedom.
For example, where the text (Exod. 32:16) says that the Ten Commandments were
‘engraved on the Tablets’, a rabbinic play of words reads the Hebrew word for
‘engraved’ (charut) as ‘freedom’ (cherut), yielding the meaning that the Tablets
proclaim freedom (b. Eruvin 54a). This is in stark contrast to the assertion of Paul that
the Torah brings slavery, Galatians 4:24. The central theme of the yearly festival of
Passover, celebrated in the home in the liturgy of the Seder, is freedom.
7Thisidealistic concept proved so unworkable that it was eventually modified by the
Pharisee teacher Hillel, who instituted the prosbol, a legal instrument by which the
seven-year remission of debts could be avoided, except in the case when the debtor
was totally destitute. See Maccoby (1988), pp. 75–7.
8Ithas been argued that the abolition of slavery only became economically possible with
the invention of power-driven machinery.
9To be sure, the link (deduced by the hermeneutical method known as semukhin)
between the Tabernacle and the Sabbath is a negative one: the kinds of work
forbidden on the Sabbath are those which were required for the building of the
Tabernacle. Yet there is here a strange dream-like inversion; these forms of work were
hallowed by their use in building the Tabernacle yet, on the Sabbath, are forbidden.
Somehow, even though negatively, the Tabernacle creates the Sabbath and the
Sabbath reflects the Tabernacle. And, within the Tabernacle (later the Temple) the
prohibitions of the Sabbath are overcome. All activities involved in the service of the
Tabernacle must be performed even when they violate the laws of the Sabbath. The
Tabernacle is a holy area which, which like the Messianic era, resolves the dichotomy
 between weekday and Sabbath.
10
Douglas (1999), pp. 4–5.
11Maccoby (1999).
12Jacobson (1982).
13
Mary Douglas, by literary analysis, has shown that the chapter in which this occurs
(Lev. 19) is the fulcrum round which the whole book of Leviticus revolves. See Douglas
(1994).
14
This does not mean that life must be preserved in all circumstances. The Talmud poses
the situation in which a tyrant, on pain of death, require someone to kill his fellow. In
this circumstance, one is obliged to suffer death rather than commit murder. The
Talmud asks, ‘Why should your blood be regarded as redder than his?’ (b. Sanhedrin
74a).
 7
THE PROBLEM OF MORALITY:
RELATIVISTIC ASPECTS

It is interesting that the trend towards relativism in recent moral theory is itself largely
motivated by a moral scruple that can only be described as absolute. This is the sense of
guilt felt by members of imperialist cultures (erstwhile or continuing) towards so-called
inferior cultures. This moral scruple is itself never submitted to subjectivist theorizing,
and exists as a last remainder of a morality that is always and everywhere true.
The relativistic dogma, then, is that each culture has its own morality than can be
assessed only in terms of that culture itself. Any attempt to assess it in terms of an
unchanging moral standard, valid for all cultures, is an act of dominance and
imperialism. The bible of this trend of thought is Edward Said's Orientalism, which
dismisses all claims by Western observers of Middle Eastern countries that they are
capable of objective knowledge of their topic of study. Much quoted by relativists also is
the philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein, whose later work denied all objectivity to
discourses that attempted to bridge cultures1. Post-modernist thinkers in general have
cast doubt on all would-be objective discourses, even in the realm of physical science
and mathematics, but with more confidence in the realms of literature and history.
Yet the relativist standpoint is hard to maintain, especially in a situation of urgency. It
was noticed that the philosopher Jacques Derrida, the champion of relativistic history
and the non-objective nature of the past, struggled to establish the historical facts as
hard as anyone when he was involved in a court case concerning his financial
inheritance. Jewish post-modernists found themselves in a quandary when challenged by
Holocaust-deniers. Were they, against all their post-modernist convictions, to fight for
the objective truth and facticity of the Holocaust, or must they concede that the
Holocaust deniers had as much right to fashion a past of their own as other historians?
Some of the dialectical contortions of Jewish post-modernists in the face of this dilemma
have been worthy of compassion.
In the field of morality, too, the relativist position is easy to maintain in relation to
everyday or neutral events, but is liable to strain when extreme circumstances and
actions are under consideration, especially when one is personally involved. Does
anyone really believe that the Nazi torturers who threw live Jewish babies into a blazing
fire were merely practising the morality of their own particular culture and therefore
cannot be criticized from any absolute standpoint?
Yet the considerations that led to the standpoint of moral relativism have undoubted
weight, and must be built into any viable system of moral philosophy. The Christian
missionaries who insisted on imposing European norms of dress on Polynesian women
used to a more relaxed and unashamed dress code were absolutizing Christian morals in
a repellent way, and destroying a native culture of beauty and validity.
The rabbinic writings have much to contribute towards the problem of the conflicting
claims of relativism and absolutism in the field of morals. Talmudic Judaism provides a
system of morality that is not monolithic.
 1. The Talmud sees mankind as divided into different
cultures or ‘nations’, each of which has its own style of
living and its own special contribution to the sum of
human achievement.
Thus the Talmud shows generous appreciation of the achievements and qualities of
Greek culture. It acknowledges that the Greek language is more beautiful than Hebrew
(a great concession, in view of the sanctity of Hebrew, and the belief that it is the
language used by God in his communications with mankind). A Talmudic comment on
the verse, ‘God will make Japhet beautiful [AV, ‘God will enlarge Japhet’] (Genesis 9:27)
is, ‘The beauty of Japhet, the Greek translation, will be used in the tents of Shem, the
houses of study of the Jews’ (b. Megillah, 9b)2. A further rabbinic comment is, ‘Greek is
suitable for poetry and Latin for war’ (Esther R. 4:12).
Further, the Talmud makes no claim to supremacy in knowledge of natural science.
The only scientific topic on which the sages of Israel regard themselves as the supreme
authority is that of the calendar, with their special techniques of reconciling the solar
and the lunar year. On the biblical verse, ‘This is your wisdom’ (Deut. 4:6), the rabbinic
comment is, ‘This refers to the calculation of solstices and heavenly bodies’ (b. Shabbat
75a). This special scientific topic was necessary for religious purposes, since the dates
of the festivals depend on it, and Israelites are thus specialists in this knowledge.
Another more natural interpretation of the verse, ‘This is your wisdom’, in its context,
however, is that it refers to the Torah itself. The Deuteronomist is saying to the Israelite
community, ‘Do not attempt to be supreme in every aspect of culture, for other
communities have their own wisdom to contribute to the sum of human knowledge. This
Torah, with its teaching of morality and holiness, is your wisdom.’ The literal meaning of
the verse in context thus relativises the Israelite culture and acknowledges its
limitations even more than the rabbinic non-literal interpretation.
Even in the moral field, however, the Talmud is sometimes willing to admire
contributions from other cultures. In one Talmudic passage, for example, admiration is
expressed for the courtly, decent manners prescribed in the Persian culture (b. Berakhot
8b); manners and courtesy (under the rubric derekh eretz) are regarded as an important
aspect of morality in Jewish tradition, but no monopoly of insight is claimed in this area.
A similar openness to moral aspects of other cultures is shown in the rabbinic
admiration for the idolater Dama ben Netinah, held up as an example of the virtue of
honouring parents.
In general, it is acknowledged that each culture or ‘nation’ has something distinctive
to offer. Humanity, in all the Jewish sources, is divided irrevocably into ‘nations’, and
there is no longing for the abolition of nationhood and the absorption of all cultural
distinctions into one God-given unifying culture3. The refusal of Judaism to set itself up
as a universal Church has been denounced often enough as ‘particularism’, but modern
relativist awareness of the evil of imperialism, whether political or religious, may cast a
different light on the matter.
The root of this approach may be found in the Bible, where we are told that Nimrod
was ‘a mighty hunter before the Lord’ (Gen. 10:9). Nimrod, the Babylonian despot and
warrior, was as far removed as possible from Israelite culture and ideals, yet his
prowess as a hunter is appreciated as a human achievement even in the sight of the
Lord. Similarly, rabbinic appreciation is given to the achievement of the Romans in
imposing discipline by force on the murderous passions of humanity, even though this is
not the highest method of producing a civilized society (‘Pray for the Roman
Government, for if it were not for the fear of it, mankind would eat each other alive’,
Mishnah Avot 3:2).
The appreciation of the achievements and special qualities of other cultures is not
incompatible with a readiness to criticise other cultures for their moral shortcomings.
As a revolutionary faith which burst on the scene already occupied by ancient
civilizations, the community of Israel certainly justified its irruption by the moral failures
of previous cultures. But this did not preclude an awareness of worth wherever it was
found. The chief criticism of previous cultures was the charge of ‘idolatry’; but the
rabbis were keenly aware of a change in this respect. They declared that in the era of
Ezra there had been a world-wide cessation of idolatrous motivation, even though
idolatrous worship often continued as a traditional custom (b. Yoma 69b)4. Here the
rabbis seem to have been sensitive to the advent of higher religions (classical Hinduism,
Buddhism, Zorastrianism, Confucianism, Taoism) all over the world in what has been
called the Axial Age (700 to 200 BCE).

2. The Talmud sees always a voluntaristic element in

morality by which a moral system is adopted by human
choice from below, rather than imposed from above.
As we have seen, the rabbis saw the giving of the Torah as a covenant, or contract,
between two parties, God and Israel, to which Israel gave its consent. There is, however,
a dialectical oscillation between this view and that of a forced imposition. This
oscillation may be regarded as a hesitation between a view of the Torah as absolute and
complete truth, which one must accept willynilly, and another view of it as relative, or as
requiring the factor of human contribution and assent for its completion. If absolute, the
Torah cannot be regarded as a gift, or its acceptance as an act of voluntary
graciousness, for it is an iron necessity which imposes itself like the laws of
mathematics or logic. On the other hand, if the Torah is a gift (the view that is more
congenial to the rabbinic mind), then acceptance is a voluntary decision and non-
acceptance is a logical possibility.
There is no difficulty here if one confines one's attention to the ceremonial aspect of
the Torah. It is clear that institutions such as the Sabbath can be regarded as a gracious
gift rather than as a moral necessity. Indeed, it was for this very reason that the Sabbath
was relativised in Jewish law, and subordinated to the necessity for saving human life.
‘The Sabbath was handed over to man, not man to the Sabbath’ is a rabbinic formulation
(Mekhilta, Shabbeta 1) that was employed by Jesus (Mk. 2:27), in a slightly different
form ('given' instead of ‘handed over’). Because the Sabbath is a gift, intended for the
good of its recipient, it can be ignored whenever it threatens to bring one harm (as
when one suffers from a serious illness the cure of which requires a Sabbath infraction).
But what about the injunction to save life, or the prohibition against murder? Can
these be regarded relativistically as part of a voluntary contract or covenant? Surely
these are obligatory on every human being even without a covenant with God?
The rabbinic answer to this question is somewhat ambiguous, since it is not entirely
clear that the basic human code, the Seven Noachic Laws, is a covenant. In later
(Amoraic) rabbinic thought it is indeed treated as a covenant, which the nations
‘accepted’ (though they did not fulfil it). In earlier rabbinic thinking, it was ‘given’ to
Noah, but the word ‘covenant’ is not used. But even the word ‘given’ (rather than
‘imposed’) suggests a voluntaristic aspect.
But what would be the moral standing of mankind in the absence of a God-given code?
The suggestive answer of Maimonides (in a corrected reading of a passage in his great
code) is that those who observe the Seven Laws of their own volition and as a result of
their own moral cogitation are called ‘the sages of the peoples of the world’, while those
who observe the laws out of deference to the God who gave them are called ‘the
righteous of the peoples of the world’5. The latter (in a Talmudic phrase) ‘have a portion
in the World to Come’ (Tosefta, Sanhedrin 13:2, b. Sanhedrin 105a), but the former have
not.
Maimonides' view is not necessarily a correct interpretation of Talmudic thought, but
let us suppose that it is. It would mean that the highest form of morality must contain an
aspect of obedience to, or better, love of God. Someone who acts morally out of
reasoning, logic or even innate moral intuition, is inferior morally and spiritually to
someone who, in addition, sees his actions as in conformity to the will of God. In
psychological terms, this is like saying that a good child whose behaviour has an
ingredient of parent-love is on a higher plane than one who is good out of adherence to
a personal moral calculus (an unlikely scenario, and one which, for a novelist, might
mark the character as a prig).
 At any rate, the inclusion of love of God in the moral equation marks the Talmudic
moral theory as relativistic in contrast to the requirements of a strictly objectivist
(Kantian) morality, which assumes a fully adult parent-free (indeed society-free) status
on the part of the moral subject. In Talmudic thought, such fully-independent adult
moral status is not attainable or even desirable. The fatherhood (or motherhood, in some
formulations - the divine name Shaddai is derived from a Hebrew word meaning
‘breast’) of God gives a personal quality to the moral life. The strict objectivist rejects
this as sentimental; but a definition of morality that precludes warmth is surely lacking
an essential dimension.

3. The voluntaristic element is extended within Jewish

society by the encouragement to form voluntary groups
who choose a special way of life, either ascetic
(Nazirites, or chasidim) or providing a communal
service (havurot) or mystical (heikhalot mysticism).
The Nazirite vow is described in the Torah, where it is associated especially with some
kind of dedicated life (e.g. Samson and Samuel). It involves a purity regimen that is far
more arduous than that of the ordinary Israelite and even than that of the priest. In
addition the hair must be allowed to grow, and the Nazirite is also forbidden to drink
alcohol for the duration of his vow, which, in the rabbinic conception, is usually for one
month, though it may be for a life-time.
The Nazirite's abjuration of liquor chimes with certain aspects of biblical thought but
clashes with others. The Rechabites were one respected group among the Israelites
(claiming descent from Jethro, the father-in-law of Moses) whose way of life included
abjuration of alcohol and living in tents. They represent the survival of the values of the
nomadic life; a pattern of morality that was later taken over into Islam. It was probably
from this strand in the Israelite tradition that we find biblical stories directed against
drunkenness: the episode of Noah, and that of Lot. Also, there is a strict prohibition
against wine-drinking by the priests while exercising their duties in the Temple (Lev.
10:9).
Yet the mainstream tradition is in favour of wine, of which the Psalmist says, ‘Wine
makes glad the heart of man (Ps. 104:15).’ Wine libations accompanied the offering of
sacrifices in the Temple. This positive tradition is heartily endorsed by the rabbis. They
gave wine a sacramental role in the ceremony of the Qiddush, the rabbinic institution
which inaugurates sabbaths and festivals. One rabbi, Eleazar ha-Kappar, even said, ‘Why
does the Nazirite have to bring a sin-offering at the completion of his vow? To atone for
refraining from drinking wine’ (b. Ta'anit 11a). Another anti-ascetic rabbi, Abba Arika
(Rav), said, ‘Every person will be brought to judgment before God for all the things in
the world that he failed to enjoy’ (j. Qiddushin, end). The feast of Purim was an occasion
in the year when a degree of drunkenness was actually encouraged, as a sign of joy at
the delivery of the Jews from the machinations of the murderous Haman.
Yet asceticism has a place in both biblical and rabbinic Judaism. Not only the Nazirite,
but also every Jew, has actions and prohibitions of an ascetic nature, befitting a
dedicated community. The liturgical year contained fast days, of which the two most
important were the biblical Day of Atonement and the rabbinic Ninth of Av, the
commemoration of the destruction of the Temple. Rabbinic interpretation of the dietary
code is that the prescribed foods are forbidden for ascetic, not hygienic, reasons. One
rabbi, R. Eleazar b. Azariah, said, ‘A man should not say that he does not desire the meat
of the pig. He should say, “I desire it, but my Father in Heaven has forbidden it to me’”
(Sifra, commenting on Lev. 20:26). Another rabbi said, ‘God has been good to us, for
though he has forbidden us to eat the flesh of pig, he has permitted us to eat the fish,
called shibbuta, the brain of which tastes just like pig (b.Hullin 109b)6’
Food prohibitions were common enough in the ancient world, wherever a dedicated
group wished to show its superiority to common greed. Examples are the Orphics, the
Pythagoreans and the Egyptian priesthood.
Another motivation for asceticism was mourning. After the Destruction of the Temple,
some earnest Jews refrained from eating meat or drinking wine, in mourning for the
cessation of the meat sacrifices and the wine libations. These ascetics, however, were
reproved by Rabbi Joshua ben Hanania, by whose influence mourning for the Temple
was kept within moderate bounds (Tosefta, Sotah 15:11–13, b.B.B. 60b).
Asceticism is thus a strand in Judaism, and people who feel a call to develop this
strand beyond the norm are permitted, and even encouraged, to do so, but never given
the kind of admiration or even adoration found in Christianity for holy hermits living in
caves, or for self-torturing figures such as St. Simeon Stylites. A Nazirite's vow is his
own business, like any other vow, and does not confer charisma on him (though it is an
act of charity and piety to help to defray the expenses of his winding-up sacrifice7). Yet
the existence of such vows adds a dimension to Jewish morality, giving it an openness
and creativity that rises beyond a stagnant norm. It is possible to be an observant Jew
and yet also an eccentric.
Another kind of moral eccentricity may be practised without taking any sort of vow. It
consists of taking aspects of normal moral obligation to their logical extreme. The
Talmud contains many examples of this kind of eccentricity. A talmudic story gives us a
picture of the charismatic Abba Hilkiah.
Abba Hilkiah was the grandson of Honi the Circle-maker; and when the world needed rain, the Rabbis used to
send a delegation to him, and he would pray for rain, and it would come.
Once the world needed rain. The Rabbis sent a pair of rabbis to him to pray that rain might come. They went to
his house and did not find him there. They went into the fields and found him hoeing. They greeted him, but he
did not reply or turn his face to them. In the evening, when he had collected some twigs, he set out for home,
carrying the twigs and the hoe on one shoulder, and his cloak on the other shoulder.
All the journey, he walked barefoot, but when he came to water, he put on his shoes.
When he came to prickly shrubs and brambles, he lifted up his clothes.
When he reached his house, his wife came out to meet him, adorned with ornaments.
His wife went in first, then he went in, and the rabbis went in last.
He sat down to eat, and did not say to the rabbis, ‘Come, eat with us.’
He divided the bread for his children, giving one portion to the elder and two portions to the younger.
Then he said to his wife, ‘I know that the rabbis have come about rain. Let us go up to the roof and pray.
Perhaps, the Holy One, blessed be He, will be pleased to send rain, without any credit being given to us.’
They went up to the roof. He stood at one corner of the roof and prayed, and she stood at the opposite corner
and prayed. When the rain-clouds appeared, they came first from the direction of her corner.
When he descended from the roof, he turned to the rabbis and said, ‘Why have the rabbis come?’
They said, ‘The Rabbis sent us to the Master, that he might pray for rain.’
He said to them, ‘Blessed be the All-present, who has made it unnecessary for you to call on the services of
Abba Hilkiah.’
They said to him, ‘We know that the rain came because of the Master. But let the Master tell us these things at
which we wonder: why when we greeted the Master, did he not answer or turn his face to us?’
He said to them, ‘I was hired for the day, and I thought that I should not spend any of the time in idleness.’
‘And why did the Master carry the twigs on one shoulder and the cloak on the other?’
He said to them, ‘It was a borrowed garment. It was lent to me to act as a cloak, not to carry twigs on it.’
‘Why did the Master walk all the journey without shoes, but put them on when he came to water?’
He said to them, ‘All the journey I could see what lay before me, but in the water I could not see what lay before
me.’
‘Why when the Master came to prickly shrubs or brambles, did he lift up his clothes?’
‘Because flesh heals but clothes do not heal.’
‘Why when the Master reached his house did his wife come out adorned with ornaments?’
‘So that I would not put my eyes on another woman.’
‘Why did she go in first, then the Master, and we last?’
‘Because you are not well known to me.’
‘Why when the Master began to eat did he not invite us to eat?’
‘Because there is not much food, and you would have refrained politely from eating, and I did not want the
credit of doing you a favour which was in fact no favour.’
‘Why did the Master give his elder child one portion of bread, and his younger child two?’
‘Because the elder son stays in the house, and the younger stays all day in school (where he is not given a
meal).’
‘And why did the rain-clouds come first from the direction of the corner where the Master's wife was standing?’
‘Because she is always in the house and gives bread to the poor who come to the house, and the enjoyment of
bread is immediate; while I give money, the enjoyment of which is not immediate. Or perhaps it is because of the
bandits who were in the neighbourhood; I prayed to God that they should die, but she prayed that they should
repent.’ (b. Ta'anit 23a).
Some of Abba Hilkiah's answers show unusual moral scrupulousness, and some show
just common sense; but all of them concern behaviour that is surprising. Even though
the duties of a Jew are, as it seems, all laid down in black and white in the authoritative
texts, there is still room for individuality in putting them into practice. The chasidim, or
charismatics, among whom Abba Hilkiah is numbered, did not form a movement. They
were too individualistic for that. They represent the endless possibilities for surprise in
human moral behaviour.
Some of Abba Hilkiah's behaviour seems downright rude, as when he did not greet his
visitors and did not offer them food. The code of good manners (derekh 'eretz) was
valued, but not at the expense of honesty or sincerity. As a hired labourer, the sage felt
that he owed every second of his time to his employer. This was not the subservience of
the downtrodden. The story as a whole shows how Jewish values transcend class
divisions, for it is not even a matter of comment that a sage commanding nation-wide
respect earns his living as a farm-hand — note also that there is no question of offering
him payment for his services as a rainmaker. Even more delicate is the sage's scruple
about offering food to his visitors; this would involve insincerity on his part and
undeserved credit for generosity.
Is there, however, a touch of insincerity in the sage's disclaimer of credit for the
rainmaking itself? Surely he is aware that his fame as a rainmaker has some basis in
fact, and that the appearance of rain after his prayer is not a mere coincidence? Indeed,
his explanation of the greater success of his wife's prayer acknowledges the efficacy of
prayer itself8. His modesty, however, has a greater purpose than self-effacement. It
expresses an important value of Judaism, the abolition of magic. This value appears even
more openly in a story about another charismatic, Hanan: he is approached by children,
who beg him, ‘Abba, [Father], give us rain,’ on which he prays, ‘O God, for the sake of
these children who cannot distinguish between the Abba who gives rain and the Abba
who can only pray for rain, hear my prayer!’ (b. Ta'anit 23b). Magical practice would
bring rain by direct power emanating from the magician, manipulating Nature or the
gods9. Prayer on the other hand is a personal contact between a human being and God,
and the posture of prayer always assumes that the answer depends entirely on God's
grace.
In addition to Abba Hilkiah and Hanan, there are Talmudic records of other
charismatics who contributed their measure of eccentricity to the variety of Jewish
religious life. Honi the Circlemaker was so named because of a rainmaking incident in
which he drew a circle on the ground and announced to God that he would remain in the
circle until the rain came (M. Ta'anit 3:8). The rain indeed came, but in too great volume
for Honi's liking, so he demanded more moderate rain, which duly came. For this
imperious behaviour, Honi was reproved by the normative leader, Simeon ben Shetach,
who said, ‘If you were not Honi, I would excommunicate you. But what can I do? You
behave like a spoilt child, and God indulges you’. This behaviour indeed contrasts with
that of Abba Hilkiah, who was so careful to avoid any appearance of manipulating
God10. Simeon's protest shows that the charismatics did at times, in their privileged
eccentricity, skirt on the forbidden, or at least on the disapproved. There is no record,
however, of any serious breach between the normatives and the charismatics. The
nearest to such a breach is the recorded disagreement on matters of hygiene. The
normatives decreed that liquids (milk, wine, etc.) that had been left in the open should
be thrown away, as it might have been contaminated by snake venom (M.Ter. 8:4); the
charismatics demurred on the ground that this showed lack of faith in God's providence
(y. Ta'an. 23a). The normative common-sense principle was ‘One should not rely on a
miracle’(b. Qiddushin 39b). The normatives did not deny that miracles might happen,
especially to the saintly chasidim. But they considered that their own duty as religious
leaders and pastors was to the ordinary people, whose safety they had to protect.
A more organised form of eccentricity was to belong to a voluntary ‘fellowship’
(chavurah), members of which were called chaverim. The best known society of this kind
was the ritual purity fellowship, whose members ‘undertook’ to adhere to a standard of
ritual purity beyond the norm. The priests had to be in a state of ritual purity in order to
eat the priestly food, the terumah, but non-priests were permitted to eat their non-
priestly food while in a state of impurity. However, there was a feeling that even the non-
priestly food (chullin) had a certain holiness, if made from crops grown in the Land of
Israel, so it was considered an act of piety, though not of obligation, to purify oneself (by
immersion) before eating chullin, so as to avoid imparting impurity to this food.
Consequently, societies were set up for people who wished to dedicate themselves to
this aim (only the produce of the Land had any claim to holiness, so there was no
question of setting up such societies outside Israel, even in the pious and learned
communities of Babylonia). The degree of purity required to avoid imparting impurity to
chullin was not so high as that required for terumah, so it is incorrect to say that the
chaverim aimed to achieve the condition of the priests. There was also the consideration
that while a priest who ate his food in impurity thereby committed a serious sin, the
chaver who broke his ‘undertaking’ incurred no great guilt, and faced no greater
penalty than to be ejected from the fellowship.
Yet the ritual purity system allowed for numerous individual variations on the theme.
The Talmud records that there were some laymen who did indeed take upon themselves
a purity regimen just as arduous as that of the priests. There were even some who
practised purity at a level beyond that of the priests. This was feasible because it was
always open to a person to say, ‘I will keep to a level of purity at which, if I were a
priest, I would be able to eat the meat of sacrifices without contaminating them’ (this
being a higher level than was required for the eating of the priestly terumah)11. Such
virtuoso performances were in the nature of an individual vow rather that the
‘undertaking’ characteristic of the chavurah.
Various considerations, other than the holiness of the Land, might impel a Jewish
layman to join a chavurah. It did make him feel like a priest, even though his regimen
was less rigorous than that of the priests. After all, the Torah had called the whole
nation of Israel ‘a kingdom of priests’. The priesthood of the laity was thus an
established principle which some wished to mark by an institution, even if only a
voluntary one. A further motive was derived from mysticism. If it was necessary for
every Jew, priests and non-priests, to achieve purity before entering the earthly Temple,
surely purity was necessary in order to enter the heavenly Temple, the aim of mystics
who practised the ascent described in the Heikhalot literature.
A more mundane and practical motive for lay purity was also present. This was the
need for the collection of the priestly dues. It was most useful to have a class of laymen
who kept themselves in a state of purity so that they could enter the fields when the
terumah was separated from the crops and handle it without contaminating it — which
would have rendered it useless to the priests12.
It is important to note that a chavurah, or society, might be set up for purposes other
than observance of a special standard of purity. Especially interesting is the chavurah
which functioned as a burial society. Some people voluntarily decided to devote some of
their time to preparing corpses for burial. Since this involved handling corpses, it also
involved impurity, for corpse-impurity is the most contaminating of all. Yet those who
joined a burial society were performing a highly-respected task which, unlike in
Hinduism, carried no stigma but rather an aura of virtue. This is an example of the
danger of equating ritual purity in Judaism with that of caste systems in other cultures.
Especially in New Testament studies, the mistake has been made of regarding purity in
Judaism as equivalent to virtue and impurity as equivalent to sin13. Just like anyone else,
a member of a burial society needed to undergo purification if he or she intended to
enter the Temple (usually at the time of the pilgrim festivals). Otherwise, however,
impurity incurred by devotion to the duty of ensuring decent burial for others was a sign
of honour, not of stigma. The burial society were performing a holy task, for which
impurity was necessary. Holiness and purity are two quite distinct concepts.

4. Talmudic morality is time-bound, in the sense that

human history is periodized, the various eras having
their individual moral and socio-political framework, so
that what is forbidden in one period is permitted in
another.
Another element of relativization is the concept of historical eras each having its own
moral, or at least behavioural, framework. These eras may be listed as follows:
i. The Adamic period, from the creation to the Flood. In this era, the Seven Laws had a
somewhat different content, for in this era it was forbidden to kill animals for food,
only for sacrifice. Although the Adamic code forbade incest, this prohibition was laid
aside during the earliest period when the only wives available to Cain, Abel and Seth
were their sisters. The prohibition against incest had to give way to the superior
imperative of founding the human race.
ii. The Noachic period, which ended (for Israelites only) with the covenant of Sinai.
Noah had been given the Seven Laws, which repeated the Adamic code except that
it was now permitted to kill animals for food. Instead of a general prohibition
against eating meat, a single dietary law was introduced: it was forbidden to eat a
limb cut off from a live animal. According to the book of Jubilees (interpreting
plausibly Gen. 9:4), it was forbidden even to Noachides to eat the blood of animals
(Jub. 7:28–31); but rabbinic thought rejected this view, because Deuteronomy 14:21
explicitly permits the ‘resident alien’ (i.e. Gentile observing the Seven Laws) to eat
meat that has not been drained of blood14. The rabbis therefore had to substitute for
the more obvious meaning of Gen. 9:4 the interpretation that this verse refers to
eating a limb taken from a live animal.
During the Noachic period, the ancestors of the Israelites, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob
were not bound by the Sinaitic Torah, and this accounts for certain apparent breaches
which they committed (e.g. Abraham married his half-sister, contrary to Lev. 18:915;
Jacob married two sisters, contrary to Lev. 18:18). Yet the rabbinic literature
sometimes asserts that the Patriarchs did observe the Sinaitic laws, which they knew
prophetically; but this was voluntary, not obligatory, practice, and might admit
exceptions.
iii. The giving of the Torah on Mount Sinai inaugurated a new era, in which Israelites
were obliged to observe many new laws not contained in the Noachic dispensation.
Non-Israelites continued to be bound only by the Noachic laws.
iv. The Messianic era, according to some rabbinic pronouncements, would entail some
changes in the Sinaitic law. All sacrifices would be abolished except the thank-
offering (Lev. R. 9). Rabbinic law, too, would undergo changes. For example, the day
of mourning for the destruction of the Temple, the Ninth of Av, would be changed
into a day of rejoicing (b. Rosh Hashanah 18b, citing Zechariah 8:19).
This periodization tempers considerably the idea of an absolute unchanging moral or
behavioral standard valid for all historical periods and for all humanity, without,
however, implying a programmatic relativism.
1An interesting critic of relativism, in the fields of philosophy and anthropology, is
Ernest Gellner. See his Anthropology and Politics (1995).
2The Septuagint translation of the Hebrew Bible was regarded as a miraculous and
canonical work (see Letter of Aristeas and Megillah 9a–b). Later, however, it fell into
disrepute (probably because of its Christian use) and the more prosaic and literal
Greek version by Aquilas was substituted for Jewish use.
3It may be thought that the story of the Tower of Babel may embody such a longing,
since it ascribes the division of humanity into various nations and languages to a sin of
hubris. Yet the visions of the prophets, though they hark back to the Exodus from
Egypt and sometimes even to the Garden of Eden, never show nostalgia for the period
of undifferentiated humanity before the Separation (haflagah).
4See also b. Hullin 13b, ‘The Gentiles outside the Land of Israel are not to be considered
as idolaters; they only continue the usages of their ancestors.’
5Maimonides, Mishneh Torah, Melakhim, 8, 11.
6Shibbuta is possibly mullet. How did the rabbi get to know this identity of taste?
Presumably not by experiment. Converts to Judaism would be able to give him reliable
testimony on the matter.
7Paul was requested to do this by James (Acts 21:18–26). For the Jewish background of
 this request see Josephus Antiquities xix.294 and Genesis Rabbah xci.3.
8The second explanation of his wife's greater success is possibly a later addition to the
story, since it is a theme found in a different context in the Talmud (the story of
Beruriah, b. Berakhot 10a).
9In this respect, magic has more in common with modern science than with Judaism.
10The drawing of a circle is itself reminiscent of magical practice.
11See M. Hag. 2:7, ‘Johanan ben Gudgada used to eat according to the cleanness of holy
things all his days.’
12See Spiro (1980).
13The work of Marcus Borg is riddled with this error.
14
There may be a remnant of the older view in the New Testament (Acts) where James
forbids Gentile adherents to Jesus to eat meat that has not been drained of blood. See
Maccoby (1986), pp. 140–5 for the view that the rules for Gentile converts drawn up at
the Jerusalem Council were a version of the Noahide Laws.
15This is according to Abraham's own statement to Abimelech (Gen. 20:12) (‘…she is
indeed my sister, the daughter of my father, though not the daughter of my mother’)
by which he excused himself for having said earlier (20:2) that Sarah was his sister.
Rashi, however, argues that Sarah was actually the daughter of Abraham's brother
Nahor, not of his father Terah, but since the Torah sometimes calls grandchildren
‘children’ there was a sense in which Abraham was telling the truth about Sarah being
his sister. If Abraham could call his nephew Lot his ‘brother’ (Gen. 13:8), he could call
his niece Sarah his ‘sister’. Rashi thus ingeniously rescues Abraham from the charge
of untruthfulness, while preserving his reputation as an observer of the Torah avant la
lettre in the matter of sister-marriage (uncle-niece marriage is permitted in every
variety of Judaism). To Abimelech, however, (Rashi argues) Abraham posed
persuasively as a fellow-adherent to the more lenient Noachian dispensation, by which
he would have been permitted to marry his half-sister by his father. The germ of
Rashi's theory is to be found in the Talmud (b. Sanhedrin 58b).
 8
THE PROBLEM OF MORALITY:
FURTHER RELATIVISTIC ASPECTS

The last chapter has shown that Talmudic morality, while containing a bedrock code, is
by no means monolithic, and allows for many different life-styles and choices. The
philosophical problem presented by this picture is how such a variegated system can be
shown to have the consistency required of a theory of morals. The present chapter,
however, continues to display the flexibility and malleability of the Talmudic moral
stance.

1. Another level, or mutation, of morality is provided by

the Talmudic concept of civility (derekh 'eretz), a code
of graceful, courteous behaviour which distinguishes
the cultivated from the boor.
Courtly behaviour-codes encounter an immediate moral question. Are they
discriminatory? Do they serve to mark off a higher class? This is certainly the case with
most systems of etiquette, which were developed precisely in order to distinguish the
aristocracy from the common people. Yet even at their most discriminatory, these
systems do strike a moral chord. They envisage a possibility of human beings as
observing a code of respect and honour towards each other, sensitive to the need to
avoid all possible slights. As well as avoiding the more obvious and gross forms of
intrusion on the rights of others, human beings are here expected to avoid behaviour
that might mortify or embarrass. The moral dangers are clear: insincerity and
snobbishness, fawning to the great and exclusion of the lowly. But if etiquette can be
democratized, it can add an important element of graciousness and equality to the
community.
The democratization of etiquette in Judaism is part of the equalitarian stance
inculcated by the revolutionary origins of the Jewish religion. There is no aristocracy
among the Jews, at least in theory, and attempts that have been made at various times in
Jewish history to introduce an aristocratic class have always met with opposition from
the rabbis. But the abolition of aristocracy has not led to any idealization of the boorish
lower classes or the abandonment of the aristocratic ideal of self-respect and urbanity;
instead this ideal has been transferred to the whole people, who are to regard
themselves as a nation of aristocrats. This is illustrated by a discussion in the Mishnah:
King's children may anoint their wounds [on the Sabbath] with rose-oil since it is their custom so to do on
ordinary days. Rabbi Simeon says: All Israelites are kings' children
(M. Shabbat 14:4).

The use of medicines on the Sabbath (for minor ailments) is forbidden by rabbinic
decree, not because healing itself is forbidden on the Sabbath but because such use
might lead to the grinding of medicines which would come into the category of ‘work’.
But if some substances which one is in the habit of using for non-medicinal purposes
happen to have a medicinal effect, their use is not prohibited on the Sabbath. The case
of rose-oil is problematic, because ordinary people use it only occasionally for its
medicinal properties, while the high nobility use it every day as a mere deodorant.
Should the Sabbath law, then, be different in this respect for ordinary people and for the
high nobility? The anonymous authority of the first part of the mishnah says, ‘Yes’, but
Rabbi Simeon objects on the ground that the distinction between hoi polloi and nobility
is invalid, since all Israelites are nobility. Rabbi Simeon would not deny that in practice
differences do exist between the rich and the poor, and between royalty and commoners,
but he is reluctant to enshrine such differences in religious law, since they go contrary
to the ideal of universal aristocracy. The institution of a monarchy among the Israelites
was received with great reluctance by the prophet Samuel (1 Samuel, 8), and the book
of Deuteronomy, while accepting the institution, warns about the king, ‘ … his heart
shall not be lifted up above his brethren’ (Deut. 17:20).
A basis was found for the concept of people-wide nobility in the biblical description of
the Israelites as ‘a kingdom of priests’ (Exodus 19:6). This was interpreted in Talmudic
tradition as ‘a nation in which every individual is both a king and a priest’. Confirmation
of this was found in the biblical prescription that every Israelite must wear on his
garment ‘a thread of blue (tekhelet)’ (Numbers 15:38). The blue or purple dye made
from the chilazon (murex) was the perquisite in ancient countries of royalty, but in Israel
it was the badge of every citizen. The Torah's prescription for democracy was not
levelling-down, but levelling-up, and the cultivation of rules of graciousness and
courtesy was part of this process.
Sometimes etiquette appears to conflict with morality (just as morality can sometimes
conflict with, and override, etiquette, as in the case of Abba Hilkiah, who was so rude to
his guests, see p. 92). Is it permissible to tell a lie in order to save someone
embarrassment? For example, should one include praises of the beauty of a bride in the
wedding encomium when she is in fact ugly? Lying is forbidden, but concern for a
person's public shaming, the kindly House of Hillel thought (opposing the House of
Shammai), was more important (b. Ketubot 17a); the words, ‘O bride, beautiful and
gracious’ should always be included. God Himself once told a lie in order to avoid
causing a rift between a married couple: when Sarah doubted the announcement of her
impending pregnancy on the ground of her husband's old age, God reported the incident
to Abraham by saying that Sarah had cited her own old age (Genesis 18:12–13; see Gen.
R. 48:18, b.Yevamot 65b).
Here it is acknowledged that a matter of etiquette can sometimes involve an important
moral issue. To shame someone in public is regarded, in the Talmudic phrase, as
equivalent to bloodshed, because it causes the victim's ‘face to go white’. Public
shaming (except with very strong justification) is not just bad manners, but morally
wrong. So to follow the dictates of etiquette at the apparent expense of morality (telling
a lie) may after all serve the needs of morality on a deeper level (avoiding shaming a
person, or preserving peace between husband and wife).
Yet sometimes there can be true conflict between etiquette and moral need, as in the
following bizarre story:
Rav Kahana once went in and hid under Rav's bed to see how his teacher conducted himself in intercourse with
his wife … [Rav detected him.] Said Rav, ‘Kahana, are you here? Go out, for it is not good manners.’ Said Kahana,
‘It is Torah, and I have to learn’
(b. Berakhot 62a).

Here the thirst for Torah knowledge comes into direct conflict with derekh 'eretz. The
student, like a medical student today, is above considerations of propriety when he is
engaged in the learning process. On the same page of the Talmud we are told how Rabbi
Akiva followed his teacher Rabbi Joshua into a lavatory to learn how he conducted
himself there. He learnt three things: that one should align oneself in the privy in a
north and south position rather than east and west, that one should defecate sitting
down, not standing up, and that one should wipe with the left hand, not with the right.
Akiva later reported this incident to his own pupil, Ben Azzai, who protested, ‘Did you
act so brazenly to your teacher?’ Akiva replied, ‘It was Torah, and I had to learn.’ Akiva,
however, met with the same brazenness from his own disciple Ben Azzai, who
emboldened by Akiva's example, later followed Akiva himself into the privy for the same
purpose of edification. (Why did he need to do this, since he only learnt the same three
things? But one learns better from observation than from a lecture.) Later we find Ben
Azzai telling his disciple Rabbi Judah about the incident, with the same shocked
response and the same reply. The teacher-student relationship here is remarkable; it
does not occur to the student that his teacher would not comport himself in Torah-
fashion even in the most private situation; but the student must overcome his reluctance
to subordinate his feelings of shame and his attachment to conventional behaviour to
the needs of learning.
Usually, however, etiquette is a field separate from morality proper, and does not
conflict with it. The name given to this field is derekh 'eretz, which may be translated
‘the way of the world’. The term has various shades of meaning (sometimes it can mean
‘worldly occupation or profession’ and at times it can even mean ‘the sexual life’), but its
central reference is to the areas of life not covered by religious law (Torah) but by sense
of social decency and courtesy. This demarcation of two separate areas in the business
of living is itself problematic; does not the Torah claim to be a complete guide to life?
The very fact that a whole, though ‘minor’, tractate of the Talmud is devoted to the
subject of derekh 'eretz suggests that this topic is part of religious teaching or Torah.
Also, sometimes precepts of derekh 'eretz are supported by biblical texts, as in the
instance cited above, in which bending the truth for the sake of marital peace is
condoned by the example of God Himself. Yet such biblical proofs are acknowledged to
have the status of asmakhta (support) only; they do not raise the precept concerned to
the status of biblical law (de'oraita), and noone has ever suggested that they should be
included in the list of 613 biblical commandments. The very term ‘way of the world’
suggests a protocol that lies outside religious concerns, belonging to the politenesses
and urbanities that mark the human species as a whole rather than any religious or even
national sector of it. The rabbinic literature often acknowledges the separateness of the
two fields of Torah and derekh 'eretz, not least in the saying in the Ethics of the Fathers
(the most explicitly philosophical of all the rabbinic texts), ‘There can be no Torah
without derekh 'eretz, and there can be no derekh 'eretz without Torah’1.
What, however, is the real meaning of this saying? It has often figured in intra-Jewish
discussion and conflict, whenever the question has been raised, ‘How far should Jews
attempt to master and assimilate the non-Jewish culture of their generation?’ In the
nineteenth century, when Jews were beginning to return to the general cultural scene
after centuries of exclusion, some Orthodox Jews, notably Samson Raphael Hirsch,
rallied round the motto Torah 'im derekh 'eretz (Torah with civility), a slogan directed
against both Jewish isolationism and Jewish assimilationism. Hirsch pointed out that in
the Middle Ages, especially in Islamic countries where the yoke of oppression was
relatively mild, Jews could be loyal to their faith and also figure in the forefront of
general thought and culture. A prominent example was Moses Maimonides, halakhist,
scientist and philosopher. In Hirsch's period, when the Enlightenment posed both an
opportunity and a threat to Jews and Judaism, the concept of derekh 'eretz became vital
for Jewish survival.
Even in the Talmudic period, this expansion of the term derekh 'eretz to mean general
culture, rather than merely good manners, is sometimes found, and it is a natural
extension of the idea that a Jew must be presentable and not disgrace the Jewish people
either by cultural insularity or by his dress and appearance, especially if he belongs to
the class of Jewish scholars, the main representatives of Jewish culture. Rabban
Gamaliel II, we are told, cultivated the graces of Greco-Roman civilization, because as
political representative he came into contact with Roman officials continually (b. Sotah
49b. This suggests that certain compromises could be made, even by the chief Jewish
religious leader, in the interests of avoiding Gentile scorn or devaluation, even though,
objectively, Jewish dress and general appearance (the wearing of beards for example)
had as much entitlement to respect as their Roman equivalents. While there was also a
feeling that to abandon one's native dress and appearance was a culpable depreciation
of Judaism and even smacked of submission to idolatry, this could be overborne by the
necessity to rescue Judaism from the appearance of backwardness, in the face of a
dominant Greco-Roman culture which made exclusinve claims to civilization. These
considerations are familiar to moderns who know the history of colonialism, and the
conflict in the mind of subject peoples in India and the Middle East about the adoption
of Western dress and manners.
Apart from these inter-cultural considerations, which do affect the topic of derekh
'eretz in both ancient and modern times, there is the internal code that inculcates values
of self-respect and gracefulness in day-to-day relationships. For example, slovenliness of
dress is condemned, especially for the image-setters of Jewish society, the scholars. It is
even said that a scholar who goes out in a stained garment is ‘worthy of death’ (b.
Shabb. 14a)2. Scholars are even recommended to wear white clothes, which makes the
avoidance of visible stains even more arduous. It is remarkable, however, that this
Talmudic recommendation has been so ignored in recent times that rabbinic dress,
among the ultra-Orthodox, has become characteristically black. The colour black, in the
Talmud, is the colour of disgrace or mourning (b. Hag. 16a, b.BM 59b, b.Qid. 30a)3.
Rules of derekh 'eretz are laid down for the conduct of visitors and hosts; for the
conduct of meals; for relations between teachers and pupils; for the etiquette of other
human relationships. Such rules are not enforced by penalties; they are left to people to
operate voluntarily, on pain of being regarded as boorish.
Examples of rules of courteous behaviour are to be found in the two tractates Derekh
‘Eretz Rabbah and Derekh Eretz Zutta and also in the Mishnaic tractate of 'Avot (Ethics
of the Fathers), and in scattered passages throughout the rabbinic literature. Here are
some examples. In conversation, one should not interrupt the words of another, but
answer with deliberation, and with relevance, answering each point in the order in
which it was made. One should always ‘say something in the name of him who said it’,
i.e. not try to take credit for someone else's ideas. One should not burst suddenly into
another's house or even one's own, but give due notice of one's arrival; God Himself did
this when he called out to Adam in the Garden of Eden, ‘Adam, where art thou?’
Some rules counter well-meaning but tactless behaviour. ‘Do not pacify your
neighbour in the hour of his anger, and do not comfort him when his dead one lies
before him’ ('Avot 4:18). Peace-making and comforting are acts of loving-kindness
(chesed), but there are times when one must have the sense to be silent.
The rules of derekh 'eretz thus amount to much more than mere ‘etiquette’ (such as
the management of knife and fork at a meal). They involve sensitivity to the feelings of
others and a general requirement to conduct one's social relationships in a pleasant,
outgoing style. It was said of Rabban Johanan ben Zakkai, one of the greatest of all the
Rabbis, that noone ever managed to greet him first (b. Berakhot 17a). The exercise of
Torah virtue was not to result in a haughty, forbidding demeanour, but in friendliness
and approachability.
Yet, once again, the existence of this kind of enclave within the general body of
morality raises philosophical questions about whether Talmudic morality can ever be
systematized or reduced to general principles, or indeed (to broaden the enquiry)
whether such a reduction can ever be true to the facts of the moral life of humanity as a
whole.

2. Again qualifying any monolithic view of morality, is

the Talmudic distinction between legality and morality.
Some actions may be correct, in the sense of being
within the letter of the law, and may yet infringe the
spirit of morality that informs and creates the law.
For example, if a father makes a will in favour of someone who is not a member of his
family, his action is legal, but ‘the Sages disapprove’ ('ein mach chakhamim nocheh
heimenu) (Mishnah Bava Batra 8:5). If a robber or usurer repents and offers to return
the money to the victim, the latter may legally accept it, but ‘the Sages disapprove ‘
(since acceptance may deter others from repenting) (Tosefta Sheviit, 8). If a person
repudiates an oral contract, this is legal, but ‘the Sages disapprove’ (Tosefta BM 3).
It can be seen that even within this category, there are shades of difference. It is clear
that to repudiate an oral contract is dishonorable behaviour, while to accept the return
of money of which one has been illegally deprived is merely to forego an opportunity of
generous and community-aware behaviour. Yet both are discouraged under the same
rubric of disapproval by the Sages. It seems that the Sages use their power of
disapproval (which can operate successfully only in a very decent and morally-nuanced
society), to promote behaviour that voluntarily transcends the norm. Yet this kind of
transcendence differs significantly from that of the ‘saints’ (chasidim) who practise a
supererogatory code; respect for the approval of the Sages is not a pursuit of a higher
spirituality, but acknowledgment that certain things are not ‘done’ in a self-respecting
community. The rabbis have a power of legislation, by which they can make things
illegal even if not forbidden in the more awesome code of the written Torah. But
sometimes they prefer not to resort to legislation, but to leave the matter to the
individual conscience, though they make their own moral preference known.
The distinction between legality and morality, however, is much less far-reaching in
rabbinic thought than in modern secular societies, in which the separation of church
and state has led to the formation of separate codes of living. For example, in modern
states, adultery is not illegal, though it is regarded as immoral. In so far as the rabbis
exercised jurisdiction, they treated adultery as illegal, though the death-penalty verdict
demanded by the Torah was virtually impossible in view of the quality of evidence
required (two eye-witnesses, plus evidence that the offenders were warned before the
offence).
Judaism, however, does acknowledge a separation of powers, by which the secular
authority (the monarchy in biblical times, and the Exilarchate in later Babylonia) has its
own field of legislation, but cannot overrule religious legislation. Thus in a functioning
Jewish state, there would be many acts that were illegal (made so by royal decree), such
as traffic offences, without being religiously forbidden.
There is even a category of actions within religious jurisdiction that are illegal without
being immoral; for example, polygamy, permitted in Judaism (which therefore defines
adultery differently from Christianity), was made illegal for Ashkenazi Jews (but not for
Sefardi Jews) in about 1000 CE by the statute of Rabbenu Gershom. Yet monogamy,
though not morally demanded, was not without moral standing even in early Judaism,
though, unlike in Christianity, it was regarded as a counsel of perfection.

3. ‘The code of the saints’ (middat chasidim) is another

level of morality by which ordinary, run-of-the-mill
morality is relativized, even though it remains the
practical norm.
A chasid, or ‘saint’, in rabbinic Judaism, is someone who is not satisfied with fulfilling
his ordinary duties as a Jew but wishes to go further4. In a sense, this is also the aim of
certain performers of voluntary services who are not called chasidim; namely, the
members of the various ‘societies’ (see p. 00), who are called chaverim. But the chasid is
not a member of a society or even of a movement; he is a lone individual who pursues a
life marked by originality and virtuosity. He is not necessarily even a mystic, though
mysticism too is a way of transcending normality. The chasid's activity is firmly rooted in
law, yet he plays his own tune on the law and puts it to unprecedented uses. He is said
to act ‘within the line of the law’ (lifnim mishurat hadin). More intelligible to modern
ears would be ‘beyond the line of the law’, but the Hebrew phrase stresses that the saint
is delving into the profoundest inner meanings of the law, rather than in any way
rejecting it or improving on it. The best-known chasidic figures featured in the rabbinic
literature are Honi the Circle-maker, Hanina ben Dosa and Abba Hilkiah, who have been
discussed on a previous page.
Here it remains to be added that in rabbinic Judaism, the possibility of supererogatory
virtue does not devalue ordinary virtue, which remains central. Here is an important
difference in moral theory between Judaism and Christianity. Jesus is portrayed in the
Gospels as advocating a kind of virtue which in Judaism would be regarded as valid but
supererogatory (for example, that even to contemplate adultery in one's heart is itself a
form of adultery, Mt. 5:28). Such a strained form of morality is regarded by the rabbis as
suitable only for exceptional individuals (for example, Rabbi Eliezer is credited with the
very same assessment of adulterous thoughts, as well as with other ideas of
supererogation, for example remarks that recall Jesus' call to take no thought for the
morrow). But to take such heroic morality as the norm would be to condemn ordinary
people to moral despair, and this is indeed perhaps the aim in Pauline Christianity,
where ordinary morality is condemned as worthless, and all hopes are to be centred on
the atoning power of the Cross.
 Yet it is probable that this Pauline interpretation is not actually a correct
understanding of Jesus' own thought. As a claimant to the Messiahship, he thought he
was living at an exceptional time when a higher level of morality was demanded of
people, like himself and his disciples, who were key figures in bringing about the
transformation of the earth into a realm of peace and prosperity, in accordance with the
prophecies of Isaiah and Zechariah. He did not regard himself as a sacrificial figure,
whose death would redeem ordinary humanity from sins too deep to be remedied by the
processes of moral behaviour, repentance and re-dedication prescribed in Judaism. The
Gospel emphasis on Jesus' pre-knowledge of his own approaching death on the Cross is
a post hoc development, written in at a time when the death of Jesus, rather than his
life, had become the central meaning of Paulinism.
There is also in Talmudic Judaism a wariness about possible evils resulting from
emphasis on extreme forms of morality. There is a category named ‘the foolish saint’
(chasid shoteh), meaning someone whose desire for saintliness leads him into foolish
disregard for elementary moral requirements. An example is given of the ‘foolish saint’:
one who fails to rescue a naked woman drowning in a river because he has scruples
about approaching and seeing her naked body (b. Sotah 21b). To the rabbis this is mere
foolishness and moral insensitivity. The endeavour to rise above the moral norm has led
to a catastrophic fall below it; the biblical imperative not to ‘stand upon the blood of thy
neighbour’, Lev. 19:16 (i.e. to come to the rescue of a person in danger) has been
subordinated to a concern that is miniscule in comparison.
This does not imply that the rabbis disapproved of those who took upon themselves
the responsibilities of sainthood; only that they warned against assuming such a load
lightly. There is a rabbinic saying, ‘According to the camel is the load’ (b.Sota 13b),
which means that there are different grades of people with different moral capabilities,
and one should not overestimate one's own position on the spiritual ladder. Some
medieval commentators understood in this sense the biblical injunction, ‘Do not be
righteous overmuch’ (Ecclesiastes, 7:16). There is such a thing as spiritual over-
ambitious-ness, and the avoidance of this is an exercise in the virtue of humility5.
The concept of different moralities suitable to different personalities, or to the same
person at different stages of development, is one more example of relativistic nuance in
rabbinic moral theory.

4. Talmudic morality envisages and encourages a

continual process of law-making, by which previous
decisions are modified.
The Talmudic method of moral discussion entails constant difference of opinion, so that
often a final conclusion is never reached, and the interest lies in the process of
discussion itself. This value given to indecision and diverse polarities of meditation
reduces the scope of absolutism and promotes relativism.
The Talmud, nevertheless, takes great pains to ensure that each rabbinic voice is
consistent with itself. This results in a plurality of halakhic systems, each recorded and
constantly repaired in the name of a given rabbinic authority. The plurality of systems
promotes relativity, while the insistence on the internal coherence of each system
promotes a logical absolutism.
The constant rabbinic search for exceptions to every proposed rule brings fluidity to
moral and halakhic concepts, making an absolutist stand on any issue very difficult.
These considerations will be explored in more detail in relation to Talmudic method
and epistemology. Here it is only necessary to note that the whole tone of Talmudic
discussion militates against absolutism in ethics. Unlike the Bible itself or even
intertestamental works including the Dead Sea Scrolls, the rabbinic literature does not
set itself up as Scripture, and makes no apodeictic announcements or commands. Its
conclusions on every topic of discussion are provisional. Many of them are arrived at by
majority vote and no infallibility is claimed for such majority decisions, though the rule
of law ensures that such decisions are binding on the community until rescinded by due
process. Minority opinions are preserved and given honour. Even though the
imperatives of the Torah are regarded as absolute, they leave so much scope for
interpretation that in practice it is the discussions of the rabbis that hold the field. The
area of ethics and law therefore remains open-ended and subject to change over the
course of time. Nevertheless, as will be seen, the process of discussion, while never-
ending, is always in search of absolute truth.
1
According to one interpretation, however, this saying simply means that Torah-learning
will not succeed unless it is accompanied by a means of livelihood.
2
This is a hyperbolical mode of expression, and is not meant to be taken literally.
3See Danzger (2000).
4The term chasidim was used earlier to denote the movement that gave support to the
revolt of the Hasmoneans. It is thought that the Pharisee movement developed out of
this. Much later, the term applied to other movements: the Chasidei Ashkenaz in the
Middle Ages, and the Chasidic movement founded by the Baal Shem Tov in the
eighteenth century. Here we are concerned with figures belonging to the first century
and referred to in the rabbinic literature.
5
See Maccoby, Ephraim Meyer (1996), p. 126.
 9
TRANSGRESSIONAL SACRALISM

A form of moral relativism often found in the history of world religion is what has been
called ‘transgressional sacralism’1, by which is meant the performance of an act
normally regarded as taboo or evil in such a way that it acquires sanctity and has
beneficent consequences to the whole community. An example is the sacred incest
performed by the royal families of ancient Egypt. A rather different example figures in
the Christian myth: it is the act of betrayal of Jesus by Judas Iscariot. This is regarded as
a supremely evil act, yet without it the salvation of mankind could not have been
procured. Though not actually sanctified, this act is portrayed as fated and inevitable2.
Is there anything analogous to this in either biblical or rabbinic Judaism?
Here we may cite a Talmudic saying that was employed in this sense by the adherents
of the antinomian Frankist movement (adherents of Jacob Frank, 1726–91): ‘Greater is a
transgression performed with good intent (lishmah) than a commandment (mitzvah)
performed without good intent’ (b. Nazir 23b, b. Horayot 10b)3.
In the Talmudic context, however, this does not mean that the transgression itself has
a holy power, as Frankists thought, or as in the myth of the sin of Judas. An example of
well-intentioned transgression in rabbinic thought is the behaviour of Lot's daughters;
circumstances excused the transgression (incest), the aim being the survival of the
human race (cf. the marriages of Cain and Abel to their twin sisters). Adultery (Jael) in
the cause of saving the people is justified, just as killing is permitted in such a cause.
But adultery or killing are not permitted to save one's own individual life (b. Sanhedrin
74a).
Kabbalah, however, does at times flirt with transgressional sacralism (in its treatment
of the transgressive behaviour of Tamar and Ruth), and this bore fruit in Sabbateanism
and ultimately in Frankism. This line of thought is unTalmudic, and derives from non-
Jewish sources.
A famous essay by Gershom Scholem, ‘Redemption through Sin’4, deals with the
antinomian Gnosticism of the Sabbatean sect founded by Jacob Frank. Some writers
(e.g. George Steiner) have wrongly concluded from this essay that Frank was building
on antinomian tendencies already existing in rabbinic literature, particularly the
Midrash. Scholem, however, makes it clear that the Frankists were making illegitimate
use of biblical and rabbinic texts which they twisted (or creatively distorted) for their
own antinomian purposes. Certain Kabbalistic texts (especially Sefer ha-Temunah) did
contain the seeds of antinomianism (by predicting the obsolescence of certain laws), but
not the nihilistic concept of ‘holy sin’ (the magical efficacy of forbidden acts) which
characterized Frankism, and brought it into the realm of ‘transgressional sacralism’, as
in the Carpocratian variety of ancient Gnosticism.
What then is the meaning of the rabbinic saying (made much of by Frank), ‘Greater is
a transgression with good intent than a commandment without good intent’? The prime
example given is that of Jael, who (according to rabbinic interpretation of a passage in
the Song of Deborah, Judges 5:27), had repeated sexual intercourse with Sisera in order
to sap his strength so that she could kill him, thereby saving Israel from the power of
Syria. Jael was a married woman, so she deliberately committed adultery to save Israel
from the foreign oppressor. Yet adultery is one of the three sins for which martyrdom is
required. True, such martyrdom is demanded, in the case of adultery, for men, not for
women, since a woman, in such circumstances, is regarded as enduring, rather than
actively performing, the act (this is why Esther, who in rabbinic interpretation, was
regarded as the wife of Mordecai, is not blamed for succumbing to Ahasuerus). But in
the case of Jael, this excuse is not available, since she actually initiated the act of
adultery by seducing the weary Sisera5.
It seems then that a woman must not initiate adultery to save her own life, but may do
so to save the lives of others, especially when the ‘others’ consist of her whole nation.
Does this mean that the supreme value is patriotism? What about family loyalty? Is it
permissible to save one's family, or a member of one's family, by one's dishonour, the
choice rejected by Isabella in ‘Measure for Measure’? Such moral choices (exemplified
in the Bible by Jael and Esther, and in a more disguised form by Judith6) have exercised
the imaginations of the writers of many nations.
Another rabbinic passage, however, suggests that, in rabbinic eyes, patriotism is not
the supreme value, at least not in the sense that the welfare of the community comes
before the welfare of an individual. ‘If gentiles said to many women, ‘Give us one from
among you that we may defile her, and if not we will defile you all’, let them defile them
all, but let them not betray to them one soul from Israel’ (M. Terumot, 8:12). A similar
formula is found in the Tosefta in relation to men, ‘If Gentiles said to many men, give us
one from among you that we may kill him, and if not we will kill you all, let them kill
them all, but let them not betray to them one soul from Israel’.
The situation here, however, is not the same as in the case of Jael, who volunteered to
sacrifice her honour for the sake of her compatriots. Here, noone is volunteering, and
the issue is one of betrayal of another. Rather than perform an act of betrayal, let them
all be defiled or die. If this principle were extended to the whole Jewish nation, it could
mean the end of its history: no matter, better annihilation than betrayal. It is not the
obligation of Israel to ensure its own survival at any cost, but to keep the fundamental
faith. If that leads to the disappearance of the Jews from history, that is the
responsibility of God. In any case, as the Jews found during the Holocaust, the promises
of oppressors cannot be believed. The Germans frequently made such promises, but in
the end, the agonised Jewish leaders who (contrary to the injunctions of the rabbinic
sources) handed over the required number of fellow-Jews to save the remainder, found
that none were saved. From the Nazi point of view, the object of the exercise was not to
limit the number of Jews killed but to destroy Jewish morale by involving the Jews
themselves in the guilt of the mass murder. This is perhaps the ultimate in evil. It came
into even more diabolic form in the choice sometimes given to Jewish mothers: to choose
which should be killed, her husband or her child.
The issue of involvement in choosing the victim lies behind the rabbinic permission to
hand over the victim when no such choice is presented. If the occupying power demands
the handing-over of a named victim (i.e. one whom the Gentile power has chosen and
nominated), with the threat that otherwise the whole community will be massacred, it is
permitted to hand over the named person, but only if he is demanded on a capital
charge. Here it is indeed permissible to put the survival of the community before that of
the individual. One scholar7 has adduced this ruling as analogous to the plea of
Caiaphas before the Sanhedrin: ‘It is better that one man should die than that the whole
people should perish’ (John 11:50), but the analogy is inaccurate. Jesus was not
demanded by the Roman authority, which at this stage knew nothing about him; it was
simply the judgment of the High Priest himself that Jesus might prove to be a trouble-
maker who would offend the occupying power. This is the behaviour of a quisling, who
anticipates the wishes of the power to which he is subservient. There is no support in
rabbinic thinking for such behaviour.
A story in a rabbinic source illustrates the operation of rabbinic principles in this
matter:
Ulla ben Kishar was sought by the Romans. He fled to Rabbi Joshua ben Levi in Lydda. They sent soldiers after
him. Rabbi Joshua approached him and persuaded him, ‘It is better that you should be killed than that the whole
community should suffer through you.’ He was persuaded and Rabbi Joshua gave him up to them. Rabbi Joshua
used to converse with the prophet Elijah, but when he did this, Elijah stopped coming. Rabbi Joshua fasted for
thirty days, and then Elijah appeared. He asked, ‘Why did the Master absent himself?’ Elijah replied, ‘Am I a
friend to betrayers?’ He said to him, ‘Does not the Mishnah say, “A company of people to whom Gentiles said, Give
us one of you that we may kill him; otherwise we will kill you; let them all be killed and let them not betray one
soul from Israel. But if they singled him out by name, like Sheba ben Bichri, they should give him up and not be all
killed.’ Said he, ‘But is this the Mishnah of the saints? This thing should have been done by someone else, not by
 you’
(Gen. R. 94:9).

While this story illustrates the principle of when ‘handing-over’ is permissible, it seems
to violate another rabbinic principle: that when in certain circumstances it is right to
break the law (as when a fire must be extinguished on the Sabbath to save life), this
should be done by the most authoritative person present, not delegated to an
unimportant person. This is a vital principle, for otherwise rabbinic Judaism would
succumb to the idea that when two duties conflict, an element of evil must inevitably be
incurred: that it is a case of doing evil for the sake of good. On the contrary, rabbinic
Judaism always insists that in case of such moral conflict, the halakhic decision relieves
the situation of all guilt; that what is done is not the ‘lesser evil’ but unequivocally the
right thing to do; that, for example, the need to save life totally expunges (docheh) the
obligation to observe the Sabbath. Even more remote from rabbinic thinking is the idea
that evil is somehow consecrated in such a situation — this is the heresy of the
Frankists, who sought to consecrate such actions as that of Jael. If Jael is to be
vindicated in rabbinic thought, it cannot be by such mysticizing of transgression.
Why then did Elijah disapprove of Rabbi Joshua's action, while admitting that it was
necessary? Why did he invoke ‘the Mishnah of the saints’, as a higher law more
appropriate for someone of Rabbi Joshua's standing? Is not this a transfer of moral dirty
work to the less privileged, so that the moral elite may remain whiter than white? One is
reminded of the Christian medieval practice of transferring the sinful, but necessary,
work of usury to the Jews, who could provide a communal service by their fortunate
situation of being already damned; or the Hindu practice of shunting impure labour on
to the Untouchables. Did Elijah really think that Rabbi Joshua's concern to save the
inhabitants of Lydda from destruction was beneath him? The law of the saints' is
certainly a recognised category in rabbinic thought, but it is not elsewhere regarded as
in conflict with ordinary morality, but rather as a supplement to it (see p. 110). It is
certainly not intended as a means for the transfer of guilt.
This is indeed a difficulty, but the answer perhaps lies in the character of Elijah in
rabbinic legend. Though in some ways a supernatural being, he is not an angel or a
fount of infallible wisdom. He is rather like the genies who appear in Arab legend —
beings capable of giving miraculous help, but also at times irascible and contrary. In this
instance, Elijah is acting in character as the patron saint of the Zealots. Any hint of
collaboration with the enemy would arouse his anger, even if it has the support of the
Mishnah. Perhaps he even disagrees with the ruling of the Mishnah, which was after all
arrived at by majority decision of the rabbis. This is a wrong-headed and ignoble
decision, he thinks, and should not be relied on by someone of Rabbi Joshua's standing,
even though it provides an excuse to lesser persons to hand over a compatriot to be
executed by Roman idolaters. It is not that Rabbi Joshua, by ‘leaving it to others’ would
be transferring guilt, but rather that he would be dissociating himself from an unworthy
rabbinic ruling.
The case of Jael again provides a difficulty for the usual rabbinic attitude towards
conflict between good and evil. Did Jael do wrong by committing adultery, and was this
wrong transmuted into virtue by the result, the elimination of a threat to her people? Or
did it remain wrong, but pardonable in view of her intention? There seems to be a
reluctance to apply the principle of dechiyah or putting-aside, as in the case of Sabbath-
breaking to save life. The law against adultery cannot be temporarily removed or put
aside in this way. The Sabbath is after all a ceremonial law, not a major moral principle;
one can put aside a ritual requirement, but not a moral requirement. Yet there is
approval for Jael's action; she is praised highly by the prophetess Deborah (who calls
her ‘blessed above women’, and the rabbis too give Jael the highest praise. Is this a case
of a virtuous act that intimately involves the breaking of a powerful taboo? Is Jael a law-
breaker and also a saviour? If so, she perhaps deserves the emphasis put on her case by
the taboo-breakers or holy sinners, the Frankists, who believed in salvation through sin.
The case of Jael is a test-case for the whole rabbinic theory of morality. It is also
important for an assessment of the rabbinic attitude to women. Is it permissible for a
woman, but not for a man, to sacrifice virtue for the general good? Do we have here a
survival of a primitive nomadic or minority strategy, in which the tribe offers its women
to placate a dominant surrounding power? Such a pattern can be seen in the execrated
behaviour of the Moabites, who, afraid of the threat of the invading Israelites, sent in
their women to seduce and weaken the enemy (Numbers 25:1–9). It is also the
behaviour of Delilah, who seduced and weakened Samson, (but is regarded by the
partisan biblical author as a villainess, rather than as a patriot who uses her womanly
weapons in the interests of her people the Philistines). In the case of Israelites, however,
it almost seems that while a man is expected to sacrifice his life for the tribe, a woman is
expected to sacrifice her virtue.
Interesting is the terminology used to describe the morality of Jael's action: Greater is
a transgression with good intent than a good deed without good intent. It seems that,
despite all excuses, the act still remains a ‘transgression’, whereas, if a man sacrifices
his life for the same patriotic purpose, he is not regarded as transgressing but merely as
acting in a heroic and praiseworthy manner, performing an act of martyrdom. No-one
objects, ‘But to give away one's life is forbidden, a form of suicide.’ The male heroic act,
though formally a transgression, is entirely free of taint, whereas Jael's act still retains
an air of taboo. Jael, like Boule de Suif, is a moral delinquent whose action produces
mixed feelings; though she is not actually hypocritically repudiated by those who benefit
from her sacrifice, as in de Maupassant's story, but praised as a one who transgresses
for a good purpose.
It is necessary to distinguish carefully between the expression ‘transgression with
good intent’ (‘averah lishmah) and another expression (also employed in a perverted
way by the Frankists), ‘a good deed that comes by way of a transgression’ (mitzvah
haba'ah be'averah). The latter is always condemned in a rabbinic context: it means the
performance of a religious duty by means of a sin, for example, the offering of a stolen
animal as a sacrifice. On the basis of denunciations by the biblical prophets, such
offerings are regarded as totally unacceptable, and indeed as an insult to God. This topic
does not present any moral problem, since there is no ambiguity about the biblical or
rabbinic attitude. The case of Jael, with its different formulation ‘transgression with
good intent’ is more interesting and more puzzling.
What other examples can we find in the rabbinic corpus for ‘a transgression with good
intent’? Incidents that are brought into relation to the Jael incident in the Talmud (b.
Nazir 23b, b. Horayot 10b) are that of the daughters of Lot, and that of Tamar, the
daughter-in-law of Judah.
Here it is said that Lot's daughters were thinking ‘for the sake of a good deed’, while
Lot himself was thinking ‘for the sake of transgression’. Here the terminology is
different from the expression ‘a transgression for its own sake (with good intent)’. Lot's
daughters did not think that they were performing a transgression, but a good deed,
namely ensuring the survival of the human race. The equivocal terminology of the
dictum of R. Nachman bar Isaac is straightened out: Lot's daughters were thinking a
good deed, not a transgression — for them, it was not a transgression with good intent
but a straightforward good deed. This is more in line with usual rabbinic thinking, by
which what in most circumstances would be a transgression loses all its transgressional
character in exceptional circumstances. R. Nachman, however, is more paradoxical and
epigrammatic, but at the expense of losing the normative attitude. He wants to think of
Jael as performing a transgression and a good deed simultaneously — a more exciting, if
more questionable, idea than the formulation in relation to Lot's daughters.
One has to conclude that, in this difficult area, the rabbinic attitude is not always
clearcut and consistent. The treatment of the case of Tamar is even more paradoxical. It
is said that she ‘behaved lasciviously’ (zinetah) but with a good purpose. Her case is
contrasted with that of Zimri. ‘Tamar behaved lasciviously, and yet she became the
ancestress of kings. Zimri behaved lasciviously and was destroyed.’ The difference was
the intent. But the intent did not diminish the lasciviousness of Tamar; it was a
lasciviousness that served a good purpose. This is unsatisfactory from a moral
standpoint; if her behaviour was acceptable it should not be stigmatized as lascivious.
Again, Tamar is presented as one who sacrificed her virtue. Perhaps all that is meant is
that the behaviour of Tamar would have been lascivious in a less excusable context; or
perhaps that her behaviour had the legal status which is labelled zenut (extramarital
intercourse), a term that in itself is morally neutral.
There is an interesting contrast between these biblical stories of female virtue-
sacrifice which meet with somewhat equivocal acceptance by the rabbis, and their
attitude in a story which has a talmudic setting. The story is found in b. Sanhedrin 75a.
A man conceived a passion for a certain woman, and his heart was consumed by his burning desire. When the
doctors were consulted, they said, ‘His only cure is that she shall submit.’ Thereupon the Sages said, ‘Let him die
rather than that she should submit.’ Then said the doctors, ‘Let her stand naked before him’; they answered,
‘Sooner let him die.’ ‘Then,’ said the doctors, ‘let her converse with him from behind a fence.’ ‘Let him die,’ the
Sages replied, ‘rather than that she should converse with him from behind a fence.’ [The woman, according to one
Talmudic authority, but not according to others, was unmarried.]

This story contrasts strangely with the biblical stories of Jael, Esther and Judith, which
seem to suggest that a woman's sexual honour as expendable in the cause of saving
Jewish life. Here even the slightest sacrifice of the unnamed woman's sexual honour is
rejected by the Sages, even though a man's life is at stake.
There is, of course, the important difference that the biblical instances concern
women who have the fate of the whole Jewish community in their hands, whereas the
Talmudic story concerns the saving of only one man's life. But the fact that the decision
of the Sages extends even to the trivial loss of honour involved in conversing over a
fence shows that some more specific principle is involved, rather than a matter of mere
numbers. It is apparently important to the Sages that the woman should not make even
the slightest compromise in these circumstances, even to save a human life.
Discussion of this passage is made more complicated by the fact that it has been
subject to some bizarre misunderstandings in the history of Talmudic exegesis.
Commentators have concentrated on the dilemma of the man, instead of the dilemma of
the woman.
It has been thought (largely because of the adjacent context) that this passage deals
with the moral need of a man to undergo death rather than engage in forbidden sexual
activity. Since it is clear from other passages that martyrdom is required only for serious
sexual offences (adultery, incest), it has become a problem why the man in this story
needs to give up his life even for much less serious sexual offences, even for the most
minor rabbinical enactments, such as the prohibition against yichud, or being alone with
a woman not one's wife. Some commentators solved the problem by indeed accepting
that this passage, contrary to other Talmudic passages, demands martyrdom to avoid
such minor offences. This led to an unTalmudic extreme of puritanism, especially on the
part of the renowned Elijah of Vilna, the Vilna Gaon. Other commentators (Beit Shemuel
and Shakh) resisted this conclusion, but only by interpreting our present passage as a
unique case from which conclusions cannot be drawn.
In fact, the passage is really about the woman. The man is by no means a candidate
for martyrdom, but rather a madman, a harasser, in the grip of an obsession, and the
question is what the woman should do about this. Should she allow herself to be
blackmailed into some kind of demeaning acquiescence to his demands, on the ground
that otherwise she may cause his death? The answer of the Sages is an unequivocal
‘No’.
This passage, then, does not conflict with the rabbinic approval of Jael and Esther,
who sacrificed their virtue to the fullest extent in order to bring salvation to their
people. This was a sacrifice for an intelligible and important purpose, not to pander to
the whim of a madman. It seems then that the rabbis really did think that transgression
was permissible or even praiseworthy when performed for a good purpose. This is a
resounding endorsement of the principle that the end justifies the means.
How far does this principle extend? Does it apply only to women? The answer, after
all, is ‘No’. For one of the instances, paralleling the story of the daughters of Lot, is that
of the sons of Adam, who broke the incest prohibition by marrying their twin sisters: and
this is regarded rabbinically as perfectly correct conduct at a time when the
continuation of the human race was at stake8. It is not only women who are required to
use their sexual apparatus in normally forbidden ways for the sake of tribal or species
survival; this can also be an imperative for men, though men usually have other
alternatives, such as military expertise. Cain and Abel had no enemies to contend with;
their only weapons for survival in the dawn of history were their penises. Their incest is
indeed the breaking of an even greater taboo than that broken by their sisters, for men
are regarded as more active in sex than women9.
 But if the rabbis can happily allow the validity of incest in extreme circumstances
affecting the whole human race (though in individual cases it is strictly forbidden even if
the alternative is death) this suggests a deep relativism in moral matters. How far does
this relativism go? To what extent, in general, does the end justify the means? Is there
such a thing as sheer evil, which no circumstances can excuse? So far we have found
only one such instance: the acceptance of complicity in the choice of a victim of betrayal
(see above, p. 116), in regard to which the rabbis have a doctrine of ruat caelum. We
must now examine the role of absolutism in the rabbinic moral system.
1See Visuvalingam (1989).
2
See Maccoby (1992).
3See Tosafot on Jael, Yevamot 103a. Jael performed an act of adultery, but for a good
purpose and she received no gratification from it (Yev. 103a, Naz. 23b). She was
considered greater than the Matriarchs (Nidd. 55b).
4Scholem (1971).
5See the Tosafot commentary on b. Yev. 103a.
6Judith's story is in the Apocrypha, not recognised as canonical by the rabbis, so there is
no comment on her in the earlier rabbinic literature. At a later stage, however, her
story appeared in a midrashic form. It has been suggested that the story of Abraham's
sojourn among the Philistines, when his wife Sarah was abducted, is a disguised
version of a story in which Abraham consented to this way of preserving his life in
hostile surroundings.
7Vermes (1973), p. 50.
8Some (e.g. Ernest Gellner) have pointed out this as a ridiculously overlooked aspect of
the biblical story, but in fact the rabbis did not overlook it.
9
The daughters of Lot indeed took the active role, yet the rabbis regarded Lot as
blameworthy, but not his daughters (Lot, they explicate, was unconscious of the deed
at first because of his drunkennness, but woke up and allowed the deed to continue).
The reason probably is the presumption that Lot knew that the overthrow of Sodom
and Gomorrah was not the end of the world, unlike his more simple-minded daughters,
who thought that the fall of the cities of the plain was the end of the world, and that
consequently, they were ensuring the continuation of the human race by their incest
with their father.
 10
ABSOLUTE VALUES IN TALMUDIC
JUDAISM

We have seen that relativism plays a very great role in the rabbinic concept of morality.
Duties are relative to circumstances, to persons, to times. People may live very different
lives, and yet meet with equal approval. Voluntary activities may take different forms
and are given weight, sometimes even ranking above obligations. Duties and
prohibitions are graded according to importance, and one duty or prohibition may often
have to give way to another, so that categorical imperatives are hard to discover.
Yet beneath all these shifting perspectives, there is still a core of absolutism. Certain
moral values are beyond all considerations of relativism. The Talmudic question, ‘Is your
blood redder than his?’ strikes at the root of all self-centredness, just as Cain's question,
in the Bible, ‘Am I my brother's keeper?’ gave expression to that same self-centredness
in its starkest form.
Talmudic Judaism has often been accused of failing to see the wood for the trees; of
losing itself in details and therefore lacking the ability to acquire deep, universal
insights. In fact, there is a constant effort in the rabbinic writings to discern the
fundamental truths that underlie the details of the Law. Thus we have the following
exchange between two rabbis, Akiva and Ben Azzai, about what is the most fundamental
of all principles in the Torah:
‘Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself’ (Lev. 19:18). R. Akiva said, ‘That is the greatest principle in the Law.’
Ben Azzai said: The sentence, ‘This is the book of the generations of man’ (Gen. 5:1) is even greater than the
other.
(Sifra 89b; see also Gen. R. 24:7)

This same reduction of the multifariousness of the Torah to a single or double principle
is found in the New Testament in the dialogue of the ‘First Commandment’:
And one of the scribes came, and having heard them reasoning together, and perceiving that he had answered
them well, asked him, Which is the first commandment of all?
And Jesus answered him, The first of all the commandments is, Hear O Israel; the Lord our God is one Lord:
And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all
thy strength: this is the first commandment.
And the second is like, namely this, Thou shall love thy neighbour as thyself. There is none other commandment
greater than these.
And the scribe said unto him, Well, Master, thou hast said the truth: for there is one God, and there is none
other but He:
And to love him with all the heart, and with all the soul, and with all the strength, and to love his neighbour as
himself, is more than all whole burnt offerings and sacrifices.
And when Jesus saw that he answered him discreetly, he said unto him, Thou art not far from the kingdom of
God.

(Mark 12:28–34).1

Jesus' answer was very much in the spirit of rabbinic thinking, though it presents some
interesting contrasts with the answers given to the same question in rabbinic literature.
Rabbi Akiva, for example, unlike Jesus, evidently regards love of man as a greater
principle than love of God, since he quotes Lev. 19:18 as his ‘greatest principle’; and this
is in spite of the supreme prominence given to love of God in the rabbinic liturgy as the
central affirmation of faith (Shema).
 Another interesting contrast is that Jesus speaks of the first (or greatest)
commandment, while Akiva speaks of the ‘greatest principle’ (kelal). Here Akiva speaks
more philosophically than Jesus, for there can hardly be a commandment to love in the
sense in which other commandments are understood, i.e. as a matter of obedience
rather than personal orientation. Here Jesus seems to be more vulnerable to Kant's
charge of heteronomy than Akiva.
This philosophical concentration on principle rather than commandment is even more
evident in Ben Azzai's contribution, for the biblical verse which he singles out is not a
commandment but a statement. It appears that Ben Azzai finds even Akiva too
commandment-centred, and is looking for a Torah principle of the utmost generality. Yet
the verse which he selects appears, at first sight, to be incapable of such a weight of
meaning, being merely a transition or introductory phrase: ‘This is the book of the
generations of man’ (probably a better translation is ‘the generations of Adam’).
The answer lies, however, in the continuation of the verse: ‘On the day that God
created man, he created him in the image of God’. The whole verse enunciates both the
unity of humankind and its kinship to God. Ben Azzai seems to have in mind the great
Mishnah saying (see p. 13) that the common descent of mankind from Adam (‘the
generations of Adam’) guarantees the equality of all the human race, but he also adds
that the human race is equal not by any populist grading-down but by sharing the divine
image, a grading-up. This reminds us of the saying (see p. 102) ‘All Israel are the
children of princes’, except that the principle of universal aristocracy is extended from
Israel to humankind as a whole.
Akiva's chosen principle, ‘Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself, is open to the
charge of being too limited, since the word ‘neighbour’ could be taken to denote the
person in one's vicinity, or a person belonging to one's own community. Indeed, the
rabbinic literature, in certain contexts, does confine the range of the word ‘neighbour’
to ‘fellow-Jew’ (which includes, of course, converts to Judaism) though in the present
context of the injunction to love one's neighbour, the range always includes non-Jews
who are not evildoers. (Jesus, seeking to extend the range of neighbourship in Luke 10,
only manages to extend it as far as the Samaritans, who were a variety of Jews.) At any
rate, Ben Azzai puts the matter entirely beyond doubt by finding his basic principle of
morality in the context of Adam, the father of all mankind, rather than in a context of the
Jewish covenant.
It is clear that when a Jewish teacher seeks to unearth the essence of Judaism, he
carries out the process of philosophical abstraction in two ways:
1. he removes the distinction between Jew and Gentile, and seeks the moral principle
common to both;
2. he removes the ritual or holiness law, and seeks person-to-person morality.
These two criteria are not wholly distinct from each other, for it is the ritual or holiness
law that distinguishes between Jew and non-Jew. Such ritual laws (e.g. dietary laws and
laws of purity) are obligatory on Jews only.
But one may ask the question, ‘Is not this to abstract Judaism itself?’ How can one
arrive at the essence of Judaism by removing everything that is distinctive of Judaism as
a living religion?
The answer is that it is not correct to think of Judaism as the religion of the Jews. It is
a universal religion with the Jews playing a certain particular priestly role. The name
‘Judaism’ itself is misleading; it is a term never used in the rabbinic literature, but
rather coined by those outside the Jewish tradition2. To offer an analogy, in Catholicism,
the priesthood has certain obligations arising out of its priestly role, but one would
never assert that they have a different religion from that of the laity, and if one sought to
formulate the essence of Catholicism, one would develop a formula that would apply to
priests and laity alike.
If love of one's fellow-human is the basic moral principle of the Talmud, how is this to
be carried out in practice? It is characteristic of Judaism that it is not satisfied to
enunciate high-sounding moral principles, or to rely on moral instinct to embody them in
action. Contrary to the antinomian theory of Paul, with its reliance on undirected ‘love’
and its rejection of the complications of law, Judaism sees the implementation of love in
law. If one truly loves one's fellow-human, one wants to know how to treat him or her in
various life-situations, and this involves the careful consideration of all exigencies, with
their endless variations, and especially the weighing-up of conflicting considerations.
This involves the hard thinking involved in law, which demands brainwork as well as
goodheartedness. This is the motivation of the intellectuality of the Talmud — its
incessant making of distinctions and elaboration of alternatives.
As a central example, we may take the prohibition against murder. In the process of
philosophical abstraction that constantly seeks bedrock moral truth, all systematizations
of Judaism are built on this prohibition as the most basic of all moral commandments.
We find it in the story of Cain, in the first command given to Noah, in the Ten
Commandments given on Mount Sinai, in the Seven Noachian Laws drawn up as the
moral guide of all Gentiles, and finally in the Three Laws of martyrdom, for which one is
required to give up one's life, the other two being incest and idolatry.
However, in our search for bedrock morality in Judaism, we still have not escaped
altogether from relativism. Even incest and idolatry are not altogether ruled out in all
circumstances. We have seen that incest is permitted in order to preserve the human
race (see p. 97), and there are circumstances, according to one rabbinic view, when
idolatry is permitted in order to save life3. But what about life itself? Is it the ultimate
value, or may it be destroyed for some even more ultimate purpose? Is the prohibition
against destroying human life the final encapsulation of the moral purpose?
Why should the preservation of human life be so fundamental? Maimonides indeed
wrote: ‘Even though there are sins more serious than murder, none of them like murder
entails the destruction of civilization (yishuvo shel ‘olam)’ (MT, Rotzeah, 4:9). By 'sins
more serious than murder’, Maimonides had in mind particularly idolatry, the cardinal
offence against God. Yet he still urged that murder was a more fundamental threat to
society and therefore, from the societal point of view, the more important. Murder itself
can be looked on from a sacramental rather than a societal point of view; the root of this
is the biblical denunciation of murder as destruction of ‘the image of God’ (Genesis 9:6).
But Maimonides turns away deliberately from this rationale for the death-penalty for
murder, and gives as his guiding principle the preservation of civilization, or, literally,
‘the settlement of the world’. This principle is derived by Maimonides from the rabbinic
literature, and it is a fundamental plank of the rabbinic theory of morals.
It seems then that we have found here a principle so general that even the prohibition
of murder is subordinate to it logically. The ‘settlement of the world’ as the basic value
of rabbinic Judaism is in accord with the doctrine of love of fellow-human taken to a
communal rather than an individual level. All human beings are to regard themselves as
engaged in a project to bring the world to fruition and fulfilment, to rescue it from the
desert. Love of one's fellow human must arise from comradeship in this enterprise.
Let us see how this concept of 'settlement of the world’ is worked out in rabbinic
thinking.
We may note that those who do not contribute to the ‘settlement of the world’, even if
they do not work actively against it, are regarded as drones who do not deserve the
honour or trust of the community:
These are they who are not qualified to be witnesses or judges: a dice-player, a usurer, pigeon-fliers, or traffickers
in Seventh Year produce … R. Judah said: This applies only if they have no other trade, but if they have some
other trade than that, they are not disqualified
(M. Sanhedrin 3:3).

It may seem a far cry from the murderer to the compulsive gambler, but the link
between them is that they both remove themselves from the settlement of the world, the
one by savagely attacking it and the other by setting himself apart from it to pursue his
obsession. The punishment of the latter is not lashes but ostracism of a kind. He is not
entrusted with responsible decisions, as a juror or judge4. One might ask about games-
players or even artists (for whom gamblers have sometimes served as prototypes in
fiction). The Talmud certainly does not equate gamblers with entertainers, who are
regarded as filling a useful and even blessed role (b. Taanit 22a). The romantic
definition of the entertainer, however, merges him with that of the gambler (by the
concept that he is entertaining primarily himself). To emancipate oneself from the moral
dilemma of mankind, is to bid for superhuman or divine status. In Judaism, the basic
moral decision is to accept human status and all that it entails.
Nevertheless, it is not quite satisfactory to trace the power of the interdiction on
murder to considerations of the defence of civilization. There is a horror and sacrilege
about murder. The doctrine of the sanctity of human life gives the essential insight that
one who attacks a human being attacks God, whose life is in man. Thus murder is the
ultimate crime, and the revulsion from murder is the ultimate moral impulse. While
idolatry is the betrayal of God, murder is an assault on Him. Maimonides' suggestion
that idolatry is a worse sin than murder is thus made only provisionally, while he is
bracketing murder as a social-political crime.
Yet shocking as homicide is, it is not always murder; sometimes it is justified. The
Talmud's treatment of justifiable homicide is one of its most ably-argued topics, and it
has an important contribution to make to the modern debates about abortion, separation
of Siamese twins, suicide, euthanasia, self-defence, warfare, capital punishment, etc.,
that raise the problem in various ways.
Take, for example, the case of the separation of Siamese twins. In a recent court case,
doctors applied for the separation of a pair who were so intimately joined that without
separation neither could live. The separation would inevitably cause the death of the
weaker twin, who was dependent on the other; the life of the stronger twin, however,
would probably be saved. The parents, however, who were Catholics, refused consent,
saying they wished to leave the decision to God to bring an end to a life. In the course of
the court argument, Lord Justice Ward raised the possibility that the weaker twin should
be regarded as ‘an aggressor’ who was threatening the life of the stronger twin, and
that medical proceedings to save the viable child were a kind of self-defence5. This is a
remarkable unconscious reproduction of a rabbinic argument.
This, however, relates to the abortion of a birth threatening the death of the mother:
If a woman was in hard travail, the child must be cut up while it is in the womb and brought out member by
member, since the life of the mother has priority over the life of the child; but if the greater part of it was already
born, it may not be touched, since the claim of one life cannot override the claim of another life
(M. Oholot 7:6).

A question put by R. Hisda is recorded in another passage (b. Sanhedrin 72b), ‘Why
should the child not be killed even if the greater part of his body has emerged? Is he not
a pursuer?’ To which his teacher R. Huna replied, ‘No, she is pursued by Heaven.’
It seems then that the plea of self-defence on the part of the mother is not made when
the case is that the baby is still in the womb. In that case, the justification for taking the
life of the baby is simply that the baby or rather foetus is not yet a human being, and
must therefore be regarded as part of the mother's body, like a gangrenous limb to be
cut away to save the mother. When the baby has mostly emerged, if it is still
endangering the mother, his life may not be destroyed, since he is now a full human
being and ‘one life cannot override the claim of another life’. It is it this point that R.
Hisda intervenes with his question. Why is it wrong to destroy a life if it is threatening to
destroy another life? Surely this is the classic situation of the ‘pursuer and the pursued’.
It is a principle of rabbinic law (M. Sanhedrin 6:7) that if a person pursues another to
the point of death, a rescuer may intervene to save the victim even at the cost of killing
the pursuer (this is the principle used in modern life by armed policemen coming to the
aid of someone whose life is endangered by a murderous thug).
R. Hisda's attempt (parallel to that of Lord Justice Ward in the case of the Siamese
twins) to assimilate the case of the woman in labour to that of the ‘pursuer and pursued’
fails, however, on the ground that a baby fighting to be born cannot be put into the role
of murderous pursuer, whose intent is to kill. The situation cannot be blamed on the
baby but only on the exigencies of human living, in which difficult births are an element
in the human plight; as both ancients and moderns put the matter, it is ‘an act of God’.
It may be objected, however, that ‘intent’ is not essential to the situation of ‘pursuer
and pursued’. It is established in Jewish law that even a ‘pursuer’ who is not responsible
for his actions (a madman or a minor) may be killed by the rescuer (b. Sanh. 72b), since
the main consideration is to save the life of the ‘pursued’ not to apportion blame.
Nevertheless, the situation of the ‘pursuer’ does not cover fatalities caused or
threatened by accident; a distinction has to be made between a fatality caused through
an agency, however lacking in normal or mature intellect, and one which simply came
about through instrumentality. For example, if a death were threatened through a
person falling off a roof on to another person it would not be permissible, under the rule
of the ‘pursuer’ to divert the threat by blowing up the falling person in midair. Or, to
take a nearer analogy, a person might endanger another's life by pushing for the exit
during a fire-alarm; such a person would not qualify as a ‘pursuer’.
The conclusion, then, is that the baby is not a ‘pursuer’ and may not be killed once
born (defined as having emerged for the most part) even if the mother's life is in danger.
Before birth, however, it may be killed, not because it is a ‘pursuer’, but because it is not
yet a person, but part of the mother's body. An extension of this argument was used in
the case of the Siamese twins, where it was even argued that the non-viable twin, even
though fully born, was not a person but a mere excrescence or ‘teratoma’, a diseased or
parasitic part attached to the viable twin.
Where one person is weighed against another person, however, (and where neither is
actively threatening the life of the other) the ruling of the Mishnah is, ‘the claim of one
life cannot override (docheh) the claim of another life’.
But what about a situation where the threat is that both lives will be lost, unless a
choice is made to save one of them? Actually, this was the case with the Siamese twins,
which was made easier by the fact that the unviable twin could not live anyway — the
only question was whether the death of the unviable twin should be hastened in order to
give the viable twin a chance of life. But suppose both persons are healthy, yet only one
of them can live? This is the famous ‘Balloon’ problem: the Balloon will crash, killing all
the passengers, unless one or more of them are thrown out. The passengers are not
threatening each other; a mechanical fault is the threat, and the force of gravity. This
type of problem is treated in several areas of rabbinic literature, raising as it does
profound issues of equality in the right to life.
One form in which the problem is raised is the following:
Two men are travelling in the desert, and in the hand of one of them is a bottle of water. If they both drink of the
water, both of them will die; but if only one of them drinks, he will survive and reach civilization. What should the
man with the water do?
Ben Petura said: ‘It is better that they should both drink and they should both die; and one of them should not
look on while his comrade dies. For Scripture says, ‘Thy brother shall live with thee’ (Leviticus 25:36; i.e. if thy
brother cannot live with thee, die with him).
This was accepted until Rabbi Akiva came and taught: ‘Your life comes before his life, for Scripture says, ‘Thy
brother shall live with thee’ (i.e. not at the expense of thy life).
(b. Bava Metzia 62a).

The two alternatives offered are not exhaustive: a third choice would be for the man
with the bottle to hand it over to his companion, giving up his own life. Rabbi Akiva,
however, seems to reject this choice. He argues that a person's first duty is to himself
(‘Your life comes before his life’). To give up one's life in favour of one's fellow is an
infringement of the principle, ‘One life may not be annulled in favour of another’.
Though there is a duty to come to the rescue of one's fellow who is in danger, even at
the risk of one's life (‘Thou shalt not stand upon the blood of thy neighbour’, Lev. 19:16),
this does not extend to taking his place in a situation where death is inevitable.
Nevertheless, it is a possible view, in Judaism, that the sacrifice of one's life for another
in such circumstances is a heroic and praiseworthy act, even if not demanded as a duty.
Perhaps Rabbi Akiva only means that to save oneself is permitted, not that it is positively
enjoined.
Ben Petura, however, takes an even more extreme view: that both should die rather
than that either should be instrumental in the death of the other. This is similar to the
view of the parents of the Siamese twins, who were prepared to see them both die
rather than make a choice between them. Ben Petura's solution, despite its idealism, is
open to the criticism that it brings about an avoidable death. Yet for a while, before
‘Rabbi Akiva came’, this solution was accepted as morally the best.
This is probably because it was assimilated to the situation described in the following
famous Talmudic passage:
What is the Scriptural proof that one should suffer death rather than commit murder? This is based on reason
 (not Scriptural proof).
Once a man came to Rava and said to him, ‘The governors of my town have ordered me to kill a certain person.
If I do not kill him, the governors will kill me.’
Said Rava, ‘Let them kill you, and do not kill another. How do you know that your blood is redder than his?
Perhaps his blood is redder than yours’
(b. Sanhedrin 74a).

Certainly in this situation too, a choice has to be made between one's own life and
another's, but there are significant differences. A is actually being asked to kill B, not
just to allow him to die from thirst which he could not effectually alleviate. In the ‘Rava’
situation, A knows that he can save B by undergoing death himself, which might seem
similar to the Ben Petura choice of giving up the bottle to his companion; but it is not
the same, for the alternative there is not murder. What is in one case a quixotic choice is
here a plain duty. (Yet the Talmud is careful to point out, that the committing of a crime,
even murder, under duress is never the same as voluntary crime and is not subject to
judicial punishment.)
The discussion of such practical problems of moral conflict (once relegated to
‘casuistry’) has become common among philosophers in recent years, but the
contributions of the Talmud have been little acknowledged. It is noteworthy that in the
face of such fundamental problems (which are by no means academic and have often
been actualized in Jewish history, especially during the Holocaust6), the usual Talmudic
recourse to scriptural proof-texts fades away. Asked what is the proof-text that one must
suffer death rather than commit murder, the Talmud simply says, ‘It is reason’ (sevara).
The Talmud is saying, ‘This is natural law, which humans should know even without
recourse to the Torah7.’ In the case of the two men in the desert, a proof-text is
employed, but its irrelevance is shown by the fact that both Akiva and Ben Petura use
the same text, interpreted in opposite ways. The real conflict between the two rabbis is
one of phenomenology — their differing apprehension of an existential moral situation.
Rava's question, ‘How do you know that your blood is redder?’ points to a basic
equality between all human beings. In considering the demand of the governors to
commit murder or be oneself murdered, one is not to try to weigh up the worth of the
two victims of oppression. One is not to argue, ‘One of us must die; let it be the one who
is of less use to the world.’ It may be that the murderee is a worthless person, and the
proposed murderer a great and indispensable person; that is irrelevant. All that counts
is the redness of their blood, in which both are equal8.
While it is forbidden to save one's own life by taking the life of another who is not
attacking, self-defence against an attacker is permitted, even if this means taking the
life of the attacker. The Torah indeed goes even further, permitting a householder to kill
a burglar who breaks into his house, the presumption being that the intruder, having
shown violence by his mode of entry, is prepared to kill. The rabbis, however, introduced
a doctrine of minimum force. The householder may kill the intruder only if the latter's
intention to murder is ‘clear as day’. Moreover, if the householder can disable the
intruder without killing him, he must do so. Otherwise, the householder may find himself
in court on a charge of unjustified homicide.
A remarkable extension of the principle of defence is the doctrine of the ‘pursuer’
(mentioned earlier), for which little if any support can be found in Scripture. This allows
an ordinary citizen, who is not himself attacked, to take the law into his own hands and
take human life. The law says that if a ‘pursuer’ is seeking to kill someone, a bystander
can and should intervene, taking the role of a ‘rescuer’ and preventing the murder by
killing the would-be murderer (M. Sanhedrin 8:7).
The sanctity of human life is such that the taking of life can be excused only in the
interests of its preservation. Thus killing in self-defence preserves the life of the self-
defender which would otherwise be lost; it is better that the life of the aggressor should
be lost, since he has forfeited it by engaging in life-destruction. Moreover, everyone has
a right to life. The murderer is condemned to death by judicial process, which, by
representing officially the horror of society at the violation of life, is divested of blood-
guilt. The Torah warns against accepting blood-money as ransom for the murderer, since
this would cheapen the value of life by making it a commodity. (In rabbinic legal theory,
however, the difficulty of obtaining fully satisfactory evidence made the death-penalty, in
practice, obsolete; the life of the accused person is too precious to be forfeited on
evidence vitiated by the slightest thread of doubt; all circumstantial evidence, for
example, was ruled out, as was evidence based on confession by the accused.) But the
killer of the ‘pursuer’ is neither preserving his own life nor officially representing
society. What is the difference between him and a lynch-mob or a vigilante, who render
unauthorized and uninvestigated justice, and are therefore taking life without excuse?
How does the ‘rescuer’ know that the ‘pursuer’ really intends to kill the fleeing victim?
Perhaps the whole episode will turn out to be the rehearsal of a film-scene. It is to avoid
instant judgments that the apparatus of official justice exists.
The deciding factor is the immediate danger to the person being pursued. There has
to be provision in the law for the rescue of someone in immediate danger of his life from
a would-be murderer. There is no time for enquiry, so the rescuer must use his instinct.
He may turn out to be wrong, but while he is considering his doubts and scruples, an
innocent person may be done to death. The situation is similar to that known in modern
law codes as ‘citizen's arrest’. This right of arrest by an ordinary citizen is granted in
most codes, even though the average citizen is not recommended to confront a
dangerous person in his full murderous onslaught. To do so is to risk one's own life. The
rescuer must be prepared to face a subsequent enquiry in which he may or may not be
vindicated. But it is a comfort to all citizens to know that if one is subject to a sudden
vicious attack, the mores of society support a brave attempt at rescue, rather than
passing on the other side.
It is a principle of the Torah that a citizen must come to the rescue of a fellow-citizen
who has fallen into danger; for example, if he has fallen into a river, or if he is attacked
by wild animals or bandits. This duty is expressed in the verse, ‘Thou shalt not stand by
the blood of thy neighbour’ (Leviticus 19:16). But the duty to rescue the pursued from
the ‘pursuer’ is in a somewhat different category, since here not merely rescue may be
required but the taking of a life. The Talmud finds it difficult to derive the permission to
kill the ‘pursuer’ from Scripture, but does finally find a forced derivation. It seems clear
that the whole topic of the ‘pursuer’ is one derived from tradition, not from Scripture; it
derives from a long history of reflection and discussion about the lengths to which one
may go to save a life.
A number of necessary safeguards are worked out in the Talmudic discussion
(gemara) of the mishnah about the ‘pursuer’ (rodef). First, there is a principle of
minimum force, as in the case of the burglar, discussed above. If the attack of the
‘pursuer’ can be foiled by disabling, rather than killing, him, this must be done. Then,
the foiling of the ‘pursuer’ must always bear the character of an act of prevention, never
that of an act of revenge or even justice. If the rescuer finds that the victim is already
dead, he has no permission to continue his intervention by killing the perpetrator, who
has now come under the usual rule of law and must be tried and sentenced by a court of
law for his murderous act.
Thus, in a violent world, the solution for the rabbinic thinkers is not the renunciation
of violence expressed in the New Testament injunction ‘Resist not evil’. Society must
protect the weak from the strong, and where society's strong arm is absent, because of
crisis and emergency, the individual citizen must be prepared to protect the victim of
violence by employing his own capacity for violence. While the sanctity of life is the
bedrock of morality, when the claims of one life compete with those of another, hard
moral thinking, refined over many generations, is required to arrive at an optimum
solution.
1In the later Gospel of Matthew, this episode is divested of all the friendliness of the
dialogue between Jesus and the scribe, who is depicted as asking his question out of
enmity (Matthew 22:35–40).
2In the Bible, only the Book of Esther uses the expression mityahadim (Est. 8:17) to
describe conversion of Gentiles to Judaism, a term that betrays the nationalistic
standpoint of this work.
3
When an act of idolatry in private is demanded on pain of death (according to R.
Ishmael, b. Sanhedrin 74a), though the contrary opinion of R. Eliezer received the
majority vote.
4Marcus Borg (Borg, 1998, p. 98) totally misunderstands this passage, by introducing
once more the topic of ritual impurity. Gamblers are not ritually unclean, and can only
become so, like anyone else, by contact with sources of impurity, such as a corpse; and
they can then achieve purification in the same way as anyone else. The same applies
to tax-collectors. Ritual impurity is not an index of worthlessness, as Borg thinks, but a
state of the body that carries no stigma, but requires purification if it is intended to
enter a holy area.
5TheTimes, September 5, 2000, p. 3. The right to self-defence is expressed in the
Talmudic dictum of Rava: ‘If someone comes to kill you, kill him first’ (b. Sanh.72a).
The main biblical basis is Exodus 22:1ff.
6See,for example, Primo Levi's account of his survival through use (together with one
companion) of an exiguous source of water which they kept secret from other
prisoners. The guilty memory of this episode conduced to Levi's eventual suicide. He
was evidently unaware of Rabbi Akiva's dictum, which might have comforted him.
7See David Novak, Natural Law in Judaism (1998).
8The saying of the Mishnah, ‘A man must be saved alive sooner than a woman’ (M.
Horayot 3:7) means that if a man and a woman can both be saved, the man should be
saved first and then the woman. For example, if both are in a river, the man should be
brought out first, if simultaneous rescue is impossible. This is a matter of honour,
deriving from the patriarchal nature of rabbinic society, but it finds expression in
terms of ‘holiness’, not in terms of intrinsic superiority. A man is regarded as more
holy because his religious obligations are greater (since a woman is excused from all
commandments ‘that depend on time’). In practice, it might be argued, this regard for
honour might lead to the death of the woman, if the delay in saving her turns out to be
a crucial factor. But danger to human life is always a factor overturning other
considerations, so if delay would endanger a woman more than a man (say, because of
strong waves) she would have to be rescued first (this is the kind of consideration that
produced the Western principle ‘women and children first’ in a shipwreck). The list of
rankings given in the following mishnah (M. Horayot 3:8) is not cited in relation to
rescue, but simply in relation to precedence on social occasions. The preceding
mishnah (3:7) lays down that a woman has precedence over a man in being ransomed
from captivity and in being provided with clothing.
 11
POLITICAL THEORY IN TORAH AND
TALMUD

There is a theory (associated especially with Gershon Weiler1, but adumbrated by

several previous Zionist thinkers) that rabbinic Judaism is totally anti-political, being
fixated on theocracy. According to this view, the biblical politics of the monarchy were
abandoned by the rabbis, who had a parasitic political stance in which power was
permanently delegated to outside authority. The Talmudic dictum, ‘The law of the
kingdom (i.e. Gentile authority) is law’ (b. B.B. 54b), thus on this view represents an
acceptance of the expulsion of the Jewish people from politics and their acceptance of
powerlessness and dependence on outside government. Only with the advent of the
Jewish state of Israel did the Jewish people return to a political outlook that had lapsed
ever since the death of the last Jewish king.
I would argue, however, that this is a misrepresentation of the facts. Rabbinic Judaism,
even under conditions of powerlessness, never gave up the hope of a functioning Jewish
state with its own political constitution based on the Torah. While theocracy was indeed
the form of this state, the political outlook of the rabbis also took into account realities
of power, and the need for a practical constitution that would allow the business of
government to proceed without constant consultation of rabbinic directives. The essence
of this state is the division of powers between secular and religious authorities, with
considerable free play given to the needs of secular decision-making.
Theocracy need not preclude active, humanistic government, and may even encourage
it. We have seen that the concept of slavery to God has the implication that no citizen
can be a slave to another citizen (for example, in employer-employee relationships).
Where all are slaves to God, all are equal to each other. Moreover, the concept of
enslavement to God is in tension with the notion of covenant, by which the relationship
between Israel and God is one of negotiation and acceptance. The concept that God is
the owner of the Land, not any human being, works against the accumulation of land in
the hands of the few, and encourages the operation of institutions (shemittah) and
jubilee) that effect regular redistribution. Further, the concept that God is King means
that the human leader, even if given the title ‘king’, has to be a constitutional monarch.
‘His heart shall not be lifted up above his brothers’ (Deut. 17:20). The divine monarchy
that was so common in ancient polities was impossible in Israel, as was the non-
monarchical charismatic type of tyranny that foreshadowed the fascist regimes of the
modern world.
On the other hand, there is no need to conclude (as Weiler does) that the existence of
successful military monarchies in ancient Israel was in defiance of the theocratic ideal
of the Mosaic state (an ideal that was only fulfilled in the later anti-political schema of
the rabbis). It is true that the kings of Judah and Israel were often at odds with the
prophets. But this is not a conflict between practical politics and theocracy, of which the
prophets were the unworldly representatives. It is a clash between one wing of the
constitution and another — and the constitution was set up deliberately to enable such
clashes to take place. There is here a political doctrine of division or separation of
powers, such as is found in the theory of modern democracy2, as elaborated by
Montesquieu.
Weiler's picture of conflict, rather than separation, of powers in ancient Israel owes
much to the schema earlier advocated by both Max Weber and Friedrich Nietzsche. Both
saw early Israel as a natural political scene dominated by ruthless rulers, who did not
allow interference from either priests or prophets. After the catastrophic defeat by
Babylon, however, the priests and prophets became dominant. Actuated by
ressentiment), they eschewed natural politics and adopted an ethic of passivity and
humility, which disguised a deep desire for revenge. Nietzsche saw this attitude as
permeating Christianity, which was infected by the Jewish spirit. Yet somehow the Jews
themselves escaped the psychical consequences of their ethic of humility and quietism:
Nietzsche explained this by the theory that the Jews never believed their own teachings,
but used them to insinuate into their enemies an ethic which would eventually destroy
them3. This bizarre theory accounts for Nietzsche's blend of antisemitism with
admiration for the Jews4.
In fact, the Bible portrays a fruitful, if at times fraught, interaction between kings,
prophets and priests, and this political dialectic was given theoretical shape in the
rabbinic doctrine of the Three Crowns (M. Avot 4:13 and Avot de-Rabbi Nathan A41,
B48), the Crown of Kingship, the Crown of Torah, and the Crown of Priesthood.
According to this doctrine, authority in the Jewish state is given to three political
entities, the King, the Prophet and the High Priest. After the end of the age of prophecy
and the Temple Service, the Crown of Torah devolved upon the rabbis, who now
occupied a disproportionate role because of the demise of the monarchy and the
Temple. Yet even in the age of the Rabbis, the memory of the vital necessity of
separation of powers remained, and a version of the Three Crowns remained even in the
administration of the synagogue and of the local communities.
The predecessors of the rabbis, the prophets and later the Pharisees, maintained a
role as watchdogs of the constitution. They never aspired to substantive power, though
they sometimes attained a vicarious power in the role of advisers to monarchs. Usually,
however, they performed the role of critics. When kings or high priests overstepped
their powers, the prophet would stand forward to denounce them and remind them of
the ancient Torah constitution. For example, the king Uzziah who attempted to usurp
the functions of the priesthood is severely censured (II Chron. 26:16–21) and his
contraction of leprosy ascribed to this infringement of the constitution. Similarly, in the
time of the Second Temple, the Pharisees censured the Hasmoneans for combining the
role of King and High Priest. Whereas in the case of king Uzziah, a direct clash took
place between the priests and the king, in this case the clash was between the Crown of
Kingship and the Crown of Torah (the Pharisees), in its role of watchdog of the
constitution. The clash is represented in the Babylonian Talmud (b. Kiddushin 66a), in
somewhat equivocal style, as a demand by one of the Pharisees to King Alexander
Jannaeus, ‘The crown of kingship is enough for you, leave the crown of priesthood to the
seed of Aaron5.’ Unequivocal, however, is the statement of the Palestinian Talmud (j.
Sotah, 8:3), ‘One must not anoint priests as kings,’ for which scriptural proof-texts are
adduced by R. Judan of Ein-Todros and R. Hiyya bar Ada. This statement is a criticism of
the whole Hasmonean royal dynasty, since the Hasmoneans were of priestly lineage6.
Of the three great interlocking institutions of Jewish political theory, the least
endowed with charisma and religious feeling, at first sight at any rate, is the monarchy.
Of the kings of Judah and Israel whose reigns are described in the Hebrew Bible, very
few receive approval. Most receive the condemnation, ‘He did evil in the sight of the
Lord’. Even very successful kings, such as Ahab, who in the records of any other nation
would have been hero-worshipped, are condemned as idolaters and oppressors.
Moreover, the institution of kingship itself receives sharp criticism in the Hebrew
Bible, despite its declared origin in the Divine will. When the people of Israel asked the
prophet Samuel to set up a king over them, ‘the thing displeased Samuel’ (I Sam. 8:6).
Moreover, it also displeased God, who said, ‘They have rejected Me, that I should not
reign over them.’ The people's demand for a king is traced to an ignoble desire to be
‘like all the nations’ (8:5). Nevertheless, God instructed Samuel to accede to the
people's request and appoint a king. Samuel did so, but first warned the people what to
expect: that the king would conscript their sons, confiscate their lands, and impose
heavy taxes. ‘And ye shall cry out in that day because of your king which ye have chosen
you, and the Lord will not hear you in that day’ (8:18). Whereas the institution of the
Crown of Priesthood was firmly rooted in the Divine will and in the Sinai revelation, the
institution of the Crown of Kingship was traced to a later date, and rooted in the will of
the people, to which God and his prophet reluctantly agreed.
Yet in apparent contradiction to this anti-monarchical attitude, the Torah itself gives
much more direct Divine sanction to the institution of monarchy. In Deuteronomy 17:14–
20, God is depicted as giving sanction, as part of the Sinaitic revelation, to the setting
up of a king, long before the people's demand for a king recorded in I Samuel. Even
here, however, a certain concession is made to the view of monarchy as a human, rather
than Divine, institution. ‘When thou art come into the land which the Lord thy God
giveth thee, and shalt possess it, and shalt dwell therein, and shalt say, I will set a king
over me, like as all the nations that are about me; thou shalt in any wise set him king
over thee whom the Lord thy God shall choose’ (17:14–15). Here again the initiative
comes from the people, and even the motivation of aping the surrounding nations is
included; yet explicit condemnation is lacking. It seems clear that, despite the ostensible
priority of Deuteronomy, its standpoint on kingship is later than that of I Samuel. The
feeling that monarchy, compared with theocracy, is an inferior choice has been much
tempered.
Yet for the rabbis, the monarchy, despite all its drawbacks, is a necessary and God-
given institution, to which they give their full assent. They insist that the list of royal
exactions given so lugubriously by Samuel is not a catalogue of oppression, but a sober
outline of the rights and privileges of a king. Without such rights of taxation,
conscription and confiscation, a king cannot fulfil his task.
Thus in spite of all that Weiler and others have written, the political stance of the
rabbis is a realistic, if regretful, rejection of theocracy, and a support of the institution of
monarchy as the temporal arm of a Jewish state. Whereas the age of the Judges, from
Joshua to Samuel, is idealized as a theocracy, led by charismatics appointed directly by
God, it is acknowledged that human nature requires a less miraculous political regime,
in which continuity of government is ensured by some kind of constitutional succession7.
The king is admonished to obey the law of the Torah, yet it is accepted that in a sense
the king is above the law, since he is the depository of sovereignty in the state. Thus the
king cannot be tried by the Sanhedrin (M. Sanhedrin 2:2), and he has legitimate power
over the lives of any of his subjects who disobey, defy or insult him. For example, King
David is defended, or at least partly excused, by the Talmud for bringing about the death
of Uriah the Hittite, on the ground that the latter had been guilt of lese majeste) by his
contemptuous innuendo about the king's absence from the fighting (II Sam. 11:11) (see
b. Shabbat 56a).
Here I must register some dissent from Stuart A. Cohen, who in his book The Three
Crowns (indispensable for any student of biblical and rabbinic political theory), rather
underestimates the realism of the rabbis on political topics. He argues that the rabbis
shifted the balance of the Three Crowns by appropriating disproportional power over
the Jewish community, by which they usurped the functions of both king and priest.
Cohen thus goes some way towards agreeing with the thesis urged by Gershon Weiler,
who, however, expresses it in terms of a ‘theocracy’ that abandoned politics. It remains
important to stress, however, that the rabbis continued to believe in a functioning Jewish
sovereign state, with all three basic institutions in balance, even though this model
could be given only theoretical status in the circumstances of Jewish powerlessness,
when the rabbis were forced to exercise disproportionate jurisdiction in the absence of
both the Land and the Temple (and even in these circumstances the rights of lay
representative power were preserved in the organisation of the community and
synagogue, see p. 158 n).
It is incontrovertible that, for the rabbis, the king was an independent sovereign, who
had all the powers necessary for government, including the right to promulgate his own
system of edicts or bye-laws outside the scope of the Torah. The only curb on his power
was in external affairs; if he wanted to declare war on a neighbouring state, he had to
consult the other two arms of the state, the Crown of the Torah (in the shape of the
Sanhedrin) and the Crown of Priesthood, in the shape of the High Priest, and gain their
permission. This is in the case of a Voluntary war’ (milchemet reshut), i.e. a war which
was not one of obligation (milchemet chovah), such as a war of defence against a
threatening enemy. In the latter case, the king could declare war without consulting
anybody. There was thus some restraint on a king who liked the thought of foreign
conquest just to raise his reputation (M. Sotah 8:7, M. Sanhedrin 2:4).
 Yet despite all his power, the king was divested of religious authority. He was a
temporal, or secular, figure. If he had religious influence, it was because of his personal
qualities, not because his office as king carried religious weight. King David, for
example, was honoured as the author of most of the Psalms, and Solomon as the author
of Ecclesiastes, Proverbs and the Song of Songs, all regarded as divinely inspired works,
though not of such high inspiration that they could be included in the Prophetic section
of the Bible. But no king had divine inspiration or even religious charisma purely in
virtue of being king. In the ceremonies of the Temple, he had hardly any role; only that
once in seven years he appeared in the Temple to read ‘the portion of the King’, the
passage in Deuteronomy that outlined his royal duties, including the verse, ‘he shall not
raise his heart above his brethren’.
In no other polity of the ancient world was the king excluded in this way from religious
status and influence. The Babylonian king Hammurabi was in continual communication
with the gods, who dictated to him the code of laws that underpinned society; he was
the equivalent of Moses. In Egypt, Pharaoh was worshipped as a god. Alexander, Julius
Caesar and Augustus all received divine honours, and officiated as chief priestly figure
in the Olympic cult. In the Roman Empire, the statutory expression of loyalty was to
worship the Emperor as a god; only the Jews were excused this tribute, as a concession
to their peculiar aversion to any worship of a human being.
The doctrine of the Three Crowns is thus not merely a matter of political and
constitutional theory, though it is certainly that. It is also a profound expression of a
religious campaign — the outlawing of idolatry from political and social life. The aim is
to separate power from adoration, to drive home the lesson that the acquisition of power
does not make a person superhuman. Not only is the king not to be worshipped, he is
even excluded from officiating as a priest, whereby he might acquire a tincture of awe.
He is to be resolutely mundane.
Yet despite all this, the king in Judaism did eventually acquire a religious aura of a
very significant kind. This is the aura associated with the word ‘Messiah’. The meaning
of this word is ‘anointed’, and it derives from the coronation ceremony of a Davidic king,
whose head was anointed with a special mixture of oils reserved for this purpose. Every
king anointed in this way was given the title ‘Messiah’8.
In the tribulations of the first century BCE and in the first century CE, a special
romance attached to the designation ‘Messiah’ because of the belief that a rescuer,
descended from King David, would come for the people of Israel. He would expel the
foreign occupiers and restore the kingdom. Also, the eschatological prophecies of Isaiah
and Zechariah became attached to this hoped-for kingly figure, so that his coming was
expected to be significant not merely for the Jewish people, but for the whole world,
since he would inaugurate a new way of living for mankind, in which war, poverty and
injustice would be abolished. This was the ‘kingdom of God’ announced by Jesus, one of
the many unsuccessful Messianic claimants of the first century.
Jesus claimed to be the King of the Jews, or Messiah. His early followers of the
Jerusalem Church saw him as just that: ‘he who would restore again the kingdom to
Israel’(Acts 1:6). The reason why he was crucified was that he claimed to be the Jewish
king, and this was the charge (aitia)) inscribed upon his cross. The Romans had
abolished the Jewish monarchy, and anyone aiming to restore it was ipso facto a rebel
against Rome.
But as time went on, in the Gentile Christian Church, Jesus began to be worshipped as
God. His royal title, Messiah, translated into the Greek ‘Christ’, became a divine name.
Over a thousand years of Jewish history were shelved, and the Divine King of the ancient
religions against which Judaism had rebelled appeared once more. The doctrine of the
Three Crowns, by which the king was kept in check as an ordinary mortal, was
overturned. Of course, once deified, Jesus ceased to function as an earthly king, though
he did retain some kingly features especially in relation to the Last Days, when he was
expected to sit on a throne and mete out rewards and punishments to mankind
(millenarians even expected him to lead an army against the forces of Antichrist). In
general, however, he was thought to have left the earthly scene. The rule over the
faithful was divided in practice between Emperor and Pope, and the doctrine of the Two
Swords became the Catholic equivalent of the Jewish doctrine of the Three Crowns
(priesthood and teaching being united in the figure of the Pope, contrary to their
separation in Judaism into the persons of the High Priest and the Prophet).
It has been argued that changes in Judaism itself prepared the way for the
development in Christianity by which the King Messiah became a divine figure. Certain
figures in the pseudepigraphic literature are cited to show that the Jews in the century
before Jesus were looking to a supernatural figure to bring them salvation. It is
noteworthy however, that these figures are angelic, not kingly; whenever the Messiah is
mentioned explicitly it is clear that he is an entirely human personage, in accordance
with the Jewish tradition of human kingship. Even though it was expected that the
Messiah would receive help from supernatural beings, he himself was never conceived
as supernatural (similarly Jesus himself is reported as saying at one point that he was
able to call on supernatural angelic help, Matthew 26:53).
It is true, however, that the figure of the coming Messiah became endowed with a
romantic aura beyond anything that had been attached to the long line of kings of Judah
who were his ancestors. He was regarded not merely as a King, but as a Saviour King,
though the term 'saviour’ had no connotation of delivery from eternal damnation, as in
later Christianity, but was conceived on the model of the heroes, such as Gideon, who
had ‘saved’ Israel in the past from foreign oppressors. The coming Messiah also had the
glamour attached to the Davidic line, the much-loved dynasty that was associated with
Israel's greatest days. In English history, an analogy to the Jewish hopes for the Messiah
is the Jacobite longing for the return of the Stuarts. Perhaps the mythopoeic element
would be even better represented by the English belief in the return of King Arthur in
time of deep trouble, though the Messiah was not thought of as David redivivus), but as
David's descendant.
Thus the institution of monarchy, despite its deliberate downplaying in Jewish sources
in order to deprive it of all religious authority, was capable of inspiring feelings of
loyalty and love. These are well represented in the liturgy composed by the rabbis; for
example, in the Eighteen Blessings. Nevertheless, the association of the Last Days with
the revival of the Davidic dynasty was not an actual article of faith in rabbinic Judaism.
For example, one respected rabbi altogether denied that the Davidic Messiah would
ever come. This was Rabbi Hillel (not the great Hillel, but a descendant of his) who
declared that the Messiah would not come, because he had already come in the person
of King Hezekiah, to whom all the messianic prophecies in the Hebrew Bible referred (b.
Sanhedrin 99a). This daring view was not regarded as in any way heretical, since there
was no dogma about the Messiah that was compulsory for Jews. Rabbi Hillel, it seems,
while he believed the prophecies that depicted a coming age of peace, prosperity and
justice, did not think that this required a personal, kingly Messiah. Those few
prophecies that referred to such a personage, he thought, related to the reign of the
good king Hezekiah, whose reign was an anticipation of the great things to come in the
Last Days.
There is evidence that Rabbi Hillel was not alone in denying the necessity for a
personal, kingly Messiah. Josephus relates that the Zealot leader Menahem (Manahem),
during the course of the Jewish War against Rome, was killed by his own men when he
tried to assume royal honours as Messiah. The members of this particular faction of the
Zealots were anti-monarchists, who believed so strongly in the kingship of God that they
were not willing to accept any earthly monarch (Jewish War), 11.17. 442–3). They saw
the so-called ‘messianic’ age as a republican one, like the age of the biblical Judges. No
doubt they were inspired by the biblical account of Gideon, who after acting as 'saviour’,
refused the crown that was offered him (Judges 8:23).
Thus the sources show an ambivalence about the institution of monarchy. On the one
hand it was a focus of deep nationalist emotion and romanticism, which in Christianity
even transmuted into a reversion to an ancient form of idolatry. On the other hand, there
was always a suspicion and reserve, by which the monarchy was kept within bounds.
The Crown of Priesthood too was subject to reservations. Though Aaron, the brother
of Moses, was honoured as the first High Priest, his name was tarnished by his part in
the episode of the Golden Calf. In general, his image was that of a subordinate to his
brother, who was at the apex of the Crown of Torah. It was not expected, then, that any
High Priest would be an inspiring leader, but rather that he would perform a dutiful role
as supervisor of the ritual of the Temple. In rabbinic times, he was not even expected to
function as a teacher, certainly not as one who issued rulings or judgments on religious
or ethical matters. Yet in the Torah itself, several pronouncements are to be found that
seem to single out the priesthood as the teachers and guides of the people. For example,
the following passage seems to give the priests wide functions as teachers and judges:
… thou shalt come unto the priests, the Levites, and unto the judge that shall be in those days and enquire: and
they shall shew thee the sentence of judgment: and thou shalt do according to the sentence which they of that
place which the Lord shall choose shall shew thee; and thou shalt observe to do according to all that they inform
thee
(Deut. 17:9–10).

Even in this passage, however, the priests are put alongside the non-priestly figure of
the ‘judge’, so that the priests have the role of an advisory panel, rather than of
unequivocal authority — nor is such special authority given even to the High Priest. The
only area in which the Torah seems to give such special authority to the priests is that of
ritual purity, where the people are admonished to give exclusive obedience to the
rulings of the priest: ‘Take heed in the plague of leprosy, that thou observe diligently and
do according to all that the priests the Levites shall teach you: as I commanded them, so
ye shall observe to do’ (Deut. 24:8). Even here, however, Moses, the speaker, is careful
to point out (‘as I commanded them’) that the teaching of the priests derived from him,
the prophet. In later times, when the rabbis regarded themselves as the heirs of Moses,
not of Aaron, the priests still had a cultic role in declaring, by a formula of words,
whether an outbreak of impurity had occurred, but they did so only under the
supervision of the rabbis, and had no power of decision, qua) priests, in the matter.
Does this mean that a power-shift had taken place between biblical times and rabbinic
times? Did the power of decision and teaching move from the priests to the rabbis, from
the Crown of Priesthood to the Crown of Torah, as Stuart Cohen argues? Undoubtedly
some such shift occurred, but one must beware of exaggerating or misrepresenting its
significance.
The tribe of Levi generally, including the Aaronite section of the tribe, the priests, was
certainly given the task of being the teachers of the people, as is plainly stated in the
verse, ‘They shall teach Jacob thy judgments, and Israel thy law’ (Deut. 33:10). But this
is not the elevation of this tribe to the position of a teaching caste, with exclusive rights
of teaching. There are many indications in the Torah that the ideal is the spreading of
the teaching role throughout the Israelite community, irrespective of tribal affiliation.
For example, the following verse is addressed to all Israelites: ‘And thou shalt teach
them diligently unto thy children, and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine
house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou
risest up’ (Deut. 6:7).
Thus the Torah both builds up the Levites as the teachers of the people and
undermines this role by advocating a nation-wide programme of teaching and learning.
It is this dichotomy that is played out in the succeeding centuries, culminating in the
triumph of the rabbis as a lay leadership cutting out (almost) the teaching role of the
Levites.
Here we touch on an important social/political issue, the place of heredity in the
conduct of human affairs. Both the Crown of Kingship and the Crown of Priesthood are
in the hands of a hereditary succession. The essence of monarchy everywhere is that
power is handed on from father to son. The essence of priesthood, in Judaism though not
elsewhere, is that it belongs to the descendants of a particular family (or if we take the
Levites as well as the Aaronites or Kohanim into account) of a particular tribe.
When a particular role is essential for society, it is chancy to rely on individuals with
the requisite talents to become available and offer themselves. More reliable is the
choice of certain families to dedicate themselves to the role. The children of these
families are brought up to see their future in the required role, and also whatever
natural talents the family possesses are handed on in many cases genetically, and are
also cultivated in accordance with a family ethos. Thus we see certain families, such as
the Kennedys in America, producing generation after generation of gifted politicians;
and we see dynasties of scientists (such as the Huxleys), writers, and artists. The
drawback, of course, is that talents dry up; important positions come to be occupied by
mediocrities or incompetents. The hereditary pattern needs to be supplemented by a
regime of openness to talent. Yet even in an open society, the hereditary pattern may
still remain as counterpoint.
This complexity of societal structure is characteristic of Jewish culture. The Jewish
people itself is an example of such complexity. As a people with a conviction of
chosenness, regarding itself as having a religious mission that requires literacy and
study, it has cultivated the necessary qualities through a mixture of heredity and
openness to converts, so that young Jews (whether of indigenous or convert origin) have
striven for excellence in scholarship as other human groups have cultivated excellence
in martial or sporting qualities. Internally, Jewish society singled out the hereditary
group of Levites to be the supreme exemplars of these qualities, yet continually non-
Levites were recruited into the teaching class, until finally the Levites lost their special
role (though to this day a disproportionate number of rabbis are of Levite descent).
The result has been an ever-widening separation between the sacerdotal role (vested
in the Levites and especially the Aaronites) and the teaching role. Yet this can hardly be
described as a conflict between the Crown of Priesthood (Keter Kehunah)) and the
Crown of Torah (Keter Torah)) in which the Crown of Torah defeated the Crown of
Priesthood, as Stuart Cohen would be inclined to say. For whereas the latter was vested
from the first in an identifiable hereditary group, the former was vested from the first in
the whole people, with the Levites having a special initial responsibility. The rabbis, who
eventually took over the Crown of Torah, are not an identifiable group, marked out by
heredity, but essentially laymen who rise from the anonymous ranks of the people and
are distinguished solely by their personal qualities. The non-hereditary character of the
Torah is a rabbinic principle: ‘It is not an inheritance for you’ (M. Avot 2:12). The
question is asked, ‘Why is it unusual for scholars to have sons who are also scholars?’,
and the answer is given, ‘That it might not be said that Torah is a legacy’ (b. Nedarim,
81a). This seems to imply that God Himself intervenes to prevent scholars from forming
a hereditary class. The teachers of the Torah must not imitate the structuring of the
kingly or priestly classes. In real life, scholars often do have sons who become scholars,
and many examples of this could be given from the Talmudic records; but this is
recognised as a factor to be minimised, rather than welcomed9.
As things eventually worked out (though this was inherent from the first), the teachers
became almost entirely separated from the priests. There was nothing, of course, to
prevent a priest from being also a rabbi, if he went through the necessary course of
rabbinic training. Many of the rabbis cited in the Mishnah, for example, were in fact
priests, but this did not give them any extra authority as rabbis (except that those who
had experienced the service of the Temple while it was standing were given special
attention when giving evidence on details of Temple procedure).
The separation between the functions of priest and rabbi is one of the features that
differentiate Judaism sharply from Christianity. A Christian priest is also a teacher. By
virtue of his priesthood, he administers the sacraments, which take place in every
church, but he also preaches and teaches. The supreme priest, the Pope, is the head of
the teaching and law-making system. In Judaism, the priest administers sacraments in
the Temple in Jerusalem, the only place where sacraments are allowed. After the
destruction of the Temple, he was left only minor functions in the synagogue: the giving
of the priestly blessing, and the right to be called up first for the reading of the Law. The
High Priest (an office that ceased after the Destruction of the Temple in 70 CE), unlike
the Pope, had no law-making or teaching function. It is little understood that Jesus’
encounter with the High Priest was not with the supreme religious authority of Judaism,
but with an administrative official, who at that period was actually a Roman appointee, a
quisling, and even a heretic (since he belonged to the Sadducee sect).
The figure of Caiaphas may stand as symbol for a serious historical breach of the
Three Crowns principle, namely, the elevation of the High Priesthood to political power.
This did not occur during the biblical period, and was a result of the loss of sovereign
power and the subjection of the Israelite people to foreign rule. When Alexander the
Great conquered Palestine, he appointed the High Priest of the day to rule as his
representative over the Jews. It must have seemed an ideal solution to the problem of
colonial rule; here was a useful figurehead, a person of imposingly authoritative
appearance but no military or political punch. But it did mean that for the first time, the
priesthood tasted power, and naturally power went to its head. The priesthood became
not exactly a focus of external power, but a police force, with internal influence of
patronage and punishment. This led before long to corruption, and eventually to a
rebellion by the people both against the Seleucid successors of Alexander and against
his priestly minions10.
This rebellion led to the accession of the royal dynasty of the Hasmoneans. This again
was open to objection on constitutional grounds, since the Hasmoneans were priests.
However, it was not by virtue of being priests that they functioned as rulers, so they
cannot really be accused of perverting the ancient constitution, by which the priesthood,
as such, was separated from political power. This is probably why the Pharisees begged
the Hasmonean king, Alexander Jannaeus, not to assume the High Priesthood, but to be
content with being king (see above, p. 144).
The Hasmoneans gave way to the rule of Herod, an able and ruthless king who was
ostensibly an independent ruler, but actually functioned as a client prince of Rome. He
saw the High Priesthood as an adjunct of his power, and employed it as a pliable police
force. He continued, in fact, the policy originated by the Greeks, and later employed by
the Romans, of using the High Priesthood as a political instrument. Caiaphas, an
appointee of Rome, was the heir of this policy.
We thus see that the course of Jewish history amply justified the ancient Jewish
principle that the priesthood should not be politicized. But did the Crown of Torah ever
seek to usurp the Crown of Kingship?
To become involved in some way in politics was, in fact, an ancient prerogative of the
Crown of the Torah. The prophets who championed the Law against the depredations of
king and upper classes were entering into politics, and regarded this, indeed, as their
chief task. Moreover, the prophets even had advice to give on international affairs. But
they remained advisers and critics, and never took office. This was the extent of their
political involvement.
Similarly, the Pharisees, who were the heirs of the prophets, were critics but not
wielders of power. At times, when their advice was prized and followed, the distinction
may be somewhat hard to draw. For example, in the reign of Queen Salome Alexandra
(76–67 BCE), it might even be said that the Pharisees were in power, for the queen did
everything by their advice. But while they may have been the power behind the throne,
they never aspired to set one of their representatives upon it. The doctrine of separation
of powers made that impossible.
Yet there was one period when even the Crown of Torah appeared to come near to
assuming the Crown of Kingship. This was the period when the leader of the Sanhedrin
actually had the title of Nasi, or Prince, and even claimed descent from King David. Was
this a breach of the doctrine of the Three Crowns, and if so why was no rabbinic voice
raised against it?
This was of course a period when there was no sovereign power among the Jews. The
Romans looked around for some centre of authority, through whom they could vouchsafe
a limited form of self-administration, and found only the rabbis. The Jewish monarchy
had been abolished as too dangerous a focus for rebellion. The High Priest, in the
absence of the Temple, no longer existed. So the accession of the Patriarch to a form of
power was an outcome of circumstances. The claim of the Patriarchs to Davidic descent
was a rather pathetic attempt to invest the office with a certain charisma, rather than a
serious claim to royalty, which the Romans would not have allowed (we know that they
acted severely against people, such as the family of Jesus, who made such a claim in a
way that might have led to messianic hopes11).
Even so, we see that, as the history of the Patriarchy wore on, a development took
place that restored the old pattern of separation of powers. The Patriarch became more
and more a secular, rather than a religious, figure. In the early days of the Patriarchy, it
had proved possible to combine the role of religious teacher with that of administrator.
Gamaliel II, for example, was a leading scholar as well as an able official. The last great
figure to combine both roles was Rabbi Judah the Prince. After his time, the holder of
the Patriarchy (a hereditary office) failed increasingly to perform this difficult feat, and a
situation of separation of powers ensued. In the Babylonian Jewish community, the need
for such separation was early recognised, and it was frankly acknowledged that a high
degree of learning was not to be expected of the Exilarch (resh galuta), who presided
over the more mundane matters, while the crown of learning was awarded to the Head
of the Academy. Here too the Exilarch claimed Davidic descent, and his exercise of rule
(even though very limited under Muslim authority, being largely confined to the
collection of taxes) echoed the divided pattern of ancient times.
The system of the Three Crowns, in general, reflects a healthy suspicion of the
corrupting influence of power. The King must not acquire religious charisma, because
this would give an aura of mystical authority to his rule and make him impervious to
criticism. That is why his office must be separated firmly from that of the High Priest.
The latter, on the other hand, must be confined to a cultic role, and not allowed to use
the impressiveness of his office as an excuse to assume moral authority, which should
not belong to a hereditary group, but rather to the conscience and intelligence of the
community as a whole, whom the rabbi, as a layman, represents. The prophet (whose
successor is the rabbi) must be free of official responsibility, an adviser or consultant
rather than a ruler, so that he can stand aside from all vested interests. This system, like
all systems, was constantly breaking down under the pressure of circumstances; yet it
had a remarkable power of renewing itself. In the history of the Diaspora and
Palestinian synagogue, we see its continuation in the tension between the rabbi and the
lay President, a collaboration between clergy and laity12 which could go through stormy
passages, but reflected an instinctive traditional knowledge of the limits of office.
1Weiler (1976).
2See Stuart Cohen, The Three Crowns), CUP, Cambridge, 1990.
3Nietzsche (1980), vol. 6, pp. 192–3. See also vol. 12, p. 532.
4
Maccoby, Hyam, ‘Nietzsche and the Jews’, Times Literary Supplement, June 25, 1999.
5This account is somewhat confused, for it represents the objection of the Pharisees as
based on a rumour that Alexander Jannaeus was not of authentic priestly stock. This
implies that if his priestly credentials had been unobjectionable, no criticism would
have been offered against his combining the kingly with the priestly role. But the real
objection was precisely that such a combination of roles was forbidden. Perhaps the
intention is to say that the Pharisees, seeking in some way to nullify the
unconstitutional combination of roles, did so by invalidating Jannaeus' priestly
credentials. They may have thought that to invite him to give up the priesthood rather
than the monarchy would be less likely to provoke him to an explosion of anger.
6The early Hasmoneans did not style themselves as kings. The first to do so was
Aristobulus I, son of John Hyrcanus.
7The Bible commentator Isaac Abravanel (1437–1508), the leading Jewish pre-modern
thinker on political theory, condemns monarchy as an evil political system, yet regards
it as inevitable in view of the evil nature of humanity. He gives too little weight,
however, to the positive aspects of monarchy discernible in the Talmudic outlook.
8
Non-Davidic kings such as the Hasmoneans did not receive this coronation ceremony
and were not known as ‘Messiah’. This did not render their kingship illegitimate, as
Davidic descent was not essential for kingship. The title ‘Messiah’, however, was not
reserved entirely for the Davidic king, since the same title was borne by the High
Priest, whose inauguration ceremony also included a rite of anointing.
9This describes the situation in the Pharisee (later, rabbinic) movement. In the Sadducee
movement, however, the teaching authority of the priests continued to be asserted. In
the Dead Sea Scroll movement (which recent research associates with the Sadducees)
the teaching authority of the priests is asserted in an extreme fashion.
10Nevertheless, the period of priestly rule, instituted by Alexander, did give rise to a
faction that sincerely believed in the God-given validity, even traditional sanction, of
such rule. This strand of opinion is reflected in the book of Ecclesiasticus (Ben Sira),
which also invests the High Priest with the Crown of Torah. The strength of this view
is shown by the representations made to Pompey in 63 BCE by a delegation which
asked him to ensure that the nation would not be ruled by a king, since it was ‘the
 custom of the country to obey the priests of God’ (Josephus, Ant). XIV:41).
11
Hegesippus (Eusebius, Hist). 3:19:1 to 3:20:7) tells of the prosecution of the
grandsons of Jude ‘as being of the house of David’. Hegesippus is also quoted by
Eusebius (Hist). 3:12) as reporting,'Vespasian, after the taking of Jerusalem, gave
orders that all the members of the family of David should be sought out, so that none
of the royal tribe might be left among the Jews.’
12In ancient times, the office of archisynagogos) is attested, both in the New Testament
(Luke 8:41, Acts:18:8), and in inscriptions, e.g. that concerning Theodotus, who is
called ‘priest and ruler of the synagogue’, and is credited with having paid for the
building of the synagogue. E.P. Sanders (1992, p. 176) thinks that Theodotus was a
religious expert, and that this proves that priests and not only Pharisaic sages could
be accepted teachers in the first century, but this is to misunderstand the function of
the archisynagogos).
 12
RABBINIC EPISTEMOLOGY

The whole of rabbinic thinking, it may be said, is based on the acceptance of the Torah
as the word of God. In addition to the canonical status of the Biblical text, a further
(though rather different) layer of canonicity was instituted: the canonical status of the
Mishnah. There does not appear to be much room, then, for independent thinking of the
kind that could be characterized as philosophical. Yet canonicity is a tricky concept; it
may often function as a spur to thinking rather than as an impediment. It is worth
enquiring how far the faculty of thought was able to make use of, or even circumvent,
the canon.
First we may ask, What are the epistemological roots of belief in the authority of the
Torah? How, according to the Torah itself, and according to the rabbis, does one arrive
at this belief? Is it a mere blind acceptance of tradition, or perhaps a fear of the collapse
of communal life if such a fundamental belief were questioned?
The Torah itself makes a very direct epistemological appeal. ‘And know ye this day: for
I speak not with your children which have not known, and which have not seen the
chastisement of the Lord your God, his greatness, his mighty hand, and his stretched out
arm … But your eyes have seen all the great acts of the Lord which he did. Therefore
shall you keep all the commndments which I command you this day …’ (Deut. 11:2–8).
This might be called an empirical approach. The evidence of the eyes is to be believed.
There is no distrust of the senses as false witnesses to Reality, as in Hindu religion, or in
Plato's allegory of the cave, or in Descartes' critique of optical illusion. There is even an
appreciation of the evidential difference between experience and reported experience; ‘I
speak not with your children’ is an expression that acknowledges that knowledge
received through tradition is weaker than knowledge gained directly, so that those who
study Moses' speech in the book of Deuteronomy cannot be so sure of the authenticity of
Revelation as those actually addressed by him, who saw the miracles on which faith is
based.
Yet, on the other hand, tradition is also an important strand in biblical epistemology.
Evidence cannot always be first-hand, and if we reject second-hand evidence totally, we
shall be cut off from history. ‘Neither with you only do I make this covenant and this
oath; but with him that standeth here with us this day before the Lord our God, and also
with him that is not here with us this day’ (Deut. 29:14–15). Future generations are
included in the covenant, so that they may look back and regard themselves as
witnesses and partakers in an event that is long in the past. This annihilation of time by
membership in a historical community is expressed in the Passover Haggadah: ‘In every
generation a person should regard himself as if he has come out personally from Egypt.’
Both eye-witness evidence and historical memory testify to the authority of the
canonical text in an external way, by reference to the events surrounding its
promulgation, rather than by reference to its actual contents. But the Torah does also
adduce a more intrinsic kind of evidence; the imposing nature of the text itself.
Behold I have taught you statutes and judgments, even as the Lord my God commanded me, that ye should do
so in the land whither ye go to possess it.
Keep therefore and do them: for this is your wisdom and your understanding in the sight of the nations, which
shall hear all these statutes and say, Surely this great nation is a wise and understanding people.
For what nation is there so great, who hath God so nigh unto them, as the Lord our God is in all things that we
call upon him for?
And what nation is there so great, that hath statutes and judgments so righteous as all this law, which I set
 before you this day?
(Deut. 4:5–8).

It is remarkable here that the legislator submits the Law to the approval of the human
intellect, not relying at all, in this context, on proof of its divine origin. Even more
remarkable, the human intellect on which he relies is not even that of the people of
Israel, but of the human race in general. He is confident that ‘the nations’, when they
become aware of the details of the Torah acquired by Israel, will approve and applaud,
using their innate power of recognizing what is ‘wise’ and ‘righteous’. This tells us much
about the epistemology of the Torah. Even though human powers of reflection are
considered inadequate to solving the main moral and communal problems that confront
mankind, they are considered adequate to appreciate solutions put before them by a
superior intellect. The inadequacy renders revelation and education necessary; but the
adequacy renders them sufficient to the task. This combination of humility and
confidence underlies the reliance placed on Lawgivers such as Solon, Lycurgus,
Zoroaster, Moses, in the ancient world, people regarded as having superhuman or at
least supernormal wisdom.
The laws which the ‘nations’ are called on so confidently to admire are of two kinds:
‘statutes’ (chuqim) and ‘judgments’ (mishpatim). It is clear both from the biblical use of
these terms and from their rabbinic exegesis that ‘statutes’ are the non-rational laws,
whereas ‘judgments’ are the rational laws. Only the latter, one might think, could be
appreciated by the ‘nations’ as ‘wise’. Any human moral sensibility could be expected to
applaud laws against murder or theft; but why should non-Israelites be expected to
praise laws such as those prohibiting certain foods, or prescribing purifications such as
the Red Cow ritual?
The answer seems to be that while the ‘statutes’ cannot be admired individually for
their ‘wisdom’ (even the Israelites do not claim to be able to do this), the general idea of
having a set of regulations of this kind can) be admired. There is actually much evidence
that these regulations were admired in the ancient world as providing a framework of
dignified living and traditional piety. It was, of course, not just the Israelites who had
such regulations. Ritual purity, for example, was observed by all civilized peoples. Thus
the admiration expected was not all of the same kind: in some areas of life, just to have
regulations at all was ground for approval. This was a matter not so much of morality as
of good taste and cultured living.
At any rate, despite the Torah's often-expressed scorn for ‘idolatry’, there is no
propensity to dismiss the ‘nations’ from the category of moral beings, but rather it is
acknowledged that there is a moral and aesthetic sensibility characteristic of all
mankind. Just as the Torah places trust in the evidence of the physical senses, it places
trust too in the deliverances of the human conscience, which it regards as similar in
every community.

The epistemology of the Talmud

While we can discern certain epistemological principles in the biblical writings, we face
a much more complex enquiry when we approach the epistemology of the rabbinic
writings. For here we have a corporate intellectual endeavour involving many thousands
of individuals, all aiming at the development of a system, based on the Hebrew Bible,
but taking it in many unforeseen directions. In many ways this vast undertaking is
similar to the corporate effort of our own times which is known as ‘science’. We need to
know (as in the case of science) the underlying principles of the enquiry: not only which
human faculties are involved, but what logics, what methods of proof and disproof, and
what means of coping with disagreement? In particular, to what extent is the enquiry an
open one, unhampered by presuppositions, ready to change course and come to
unexpected conclusions?
The aim of the enterprise is to systematize the laws found in the Torah, and so make
them flexible enough to be applied to new situations. This involves generalization:
where a particular law is found, the effort is to discover the principle behind it, so that it
can be regarded as a guide to many situations not explicitly mentioned in the Torah text.
This generalizing aim can take many forms; but all of them can be seen as analogous to
the method of science, which contemplates a particular natural event and sees it as a
manifestation of a general law. The rabbinic enquirer thus takes on trust that each Torah
law does have an underlying principle and that no individual law is so arbitrary that it
eludes generalization; in the same way, the scientist takes on trust that Nature is
explicable: that events do not happen in an arbitrary way. Where the scientist takes the
book of Nature as his subject-matter, transforming it from apparent chaos into order, the
rabbinic enquirer takes the book of the Torah, searching it for implications and working
out its inner structure, in order to extract from it a new order, which he regards himself
as having discovered, rather than created. In many ways, the hermeneutic strategies
employed by the rabbis are similar to those employed by scientists. For example, the
rabbinic theory of how to build up a generalisation from particular instances is called
binyan 'av), and is very similar to the theory of induction, as expounded by Western
philosophers of science such as John Stuart Mill, except that the rabbis take their
particular instances from the Bible instead of from Nature (see p. 193 for examples).
Jacob Neusner has argued (1987) that Talmudic thinking is very different from the
Western thinking that produced science. Neusner has even elaborated terms allegedly
expressive of unique characteristics of rabbinic thought, including ‘logic of fixed
association’ and ‘polythetic taxonomy’1. This approach has been acutely criticized by
Menachem Fisch (1997), who argues, on the contrary, that rabbinic thinking is very
similar to that of Western science, and that the ‘trouble-shooting’ method by which the
rabbis constantly made improvements on earlier theorizing has much in common with
the methodology of scientific progress and problem-solving as described by Karl Popper.
A simple example of the rabbis' way of generalising and thus transforming biblical
laws is the following. The Torah discusses the obligation of the owner of an animal to be
responsible for any damage that it causes. Various examples are given: an ox damages
with its horn, or by grazing in a neighbour's field, or by trampling with its feet (Exodus
21–22). These three kinds of damage (Horn, Tooth, and Foot) may seem, in the text,
legally indifferent, but the Talmud elaborates them into three separate legal categories,
each having its own special characteristics and consequences. ‘Horn’ means aggressive
behaviour by the animal. Such behaviour is somewhat unusual, so the responsibility of
the owner of the animal is less. The owner has to pay only half the value of the damage
caused, if this is the first time the animal has behaved in this way. On the third occasion
of goring, however, full damages must be paid, as the owner is expected to have noted
by now that the animal has an unexpected pattern of behaviour and to take appropriate
precautions.
Note that although this kind of damage is called ‘Horn’, it is not the actual literal use
of the horns that is meant. Any kind of aggressive damage, whether with the feet or the
teeth or any other part of the animal's anatomy comes under the heading ‘Horn’. Here
already rabbinic exegesis has moved away from a simple, non-generalizing
understanding of the biblical text.
‘Tooth’ and ‘Foot’ have their own special characteristics by which they differ from
each other (‘Tooth’ being behaviour bringing the animal benefit, while ‘Foot’ is mere
blundering), but both of them, in contrast to Horn, are usual) modes of damage, i.e. any
normal animal can be expected to eat what lies in its path, or to tread on it. On the other
hand, if an animal eats something unusual, or goes out of its way to tread on something,
this counts as aggressive or unusual behaviour, i.e. Horn.
The question now arises, where) the damage takes place. Suppose I deposit my goods
in my neighbour's field and his ox tramples on them? Does he have to pay for the
damage? No, because I should not have placed my goods in somebody else's field.
Suppose I place my goods in my own field, and my neighbour's ox strays into it and
tramples them? The ox's owner must pay for the damage, since it is his responsibility to
see that his ox does not stray. Half-damages or full damages? Full damages, since there
was nothing unusual about the ox's behaviour.
What if I leave my goods in a public place? If an ox comes and tramples them, its
owner has no liability, since I should not leave my goods in a public place and the ox is
entitled to be there.
But suppose the ox, coming across my goods in a public place, does not trample them
but gores them with its horns? This is aggressive behaviour, which is always the
responsibility of the animal's owner, even though this responsibility is reduced to half-
damages on the first two occasions. These half-damages must be paid even if the
damage occurs in a public place.
Finally, suppose I place my goods in my own field, and my neighbour's ox strays in and
damages them by Horn? Does the diminished responsibility (arising from unusual
animal behaviour) still apply, or does the fact that the animal's owner has allowed it to
strav become the deciding factor, making him incur a penalty of full damages instead of
half?
This is where an argument between Rabbi Tarfon and the Sages occurs. Rabbi Tarfon
says that the deciding factor is the location of the damage; so the owner of the goring ox
must pay full damages. The Sages say the deciding factor is the kind of damage; so the
goring ox always incurs only half-damages. Each side of this argument tries to enforce
its case by a reasoning from formal logic, based on the rabbinic theory of the a fortiori)
argument (qal va-chomer)) — but in the course of this exchange the nature of this type
of logic itself come into question; so that what started as an interchange about a
damaging ox turns into an investigation into the limits of legal logic (M. Bava Qamma
2:5).
This is somewhat typical of the way the rabbis handle a biblical legal text. Concepts
found in the text are deepened and generalized, and situations not mentioned in the text
at all are introduced and discussed in the light of the formulations that arise. Finally, the
discussion may lead to an abstract realm (of logical method) far removed from oxen,
whether goring, grazing or trampling.
The question now is whether this elaboration amounts to a rejection of the text. Do the
rabbis leave the biblical text so far behind that they even appear to scorn it? In
attempting to answer this question, we shall be considering the structure of rabbinic
hermeneutics: the relationship between the canonical, divine authority of the text and
the developing, dynamic body of independent human thought that arises from it. The
guidelines that define the rabbinic enterprise will constitute its epistemology, its theory
of how knowledge arises and evolves.
It should be noted that the exegesis quoted above about the damaging animal does not
present itself as an improvement on the Biblical treatment of the subject, but rather as
eliciting distinctions already present in the text. The assumption is, ‘If the Torah
mentions three different kinds of animal damage, this must be for a purpose. The three
anatomical headings, Horn, Tooth and Foot, must each represent something unique, or
they would not have been separately mentioned — the Torah could have used some
umbrella expression, such as ‘body’. The Torah does not contain unnecessary, pleonastic
expressions; everything in it serves a purpose.’
As Menachem Fisch has pointed out, this approach to the text of the Torah is very
similar to the approach of scientists to Nature, which they regard as, in an important
sense, infallible. ‘Scientists, like students of Torah, will never dismiss data as
ornamental, as merely a rhetorical device, as a slip of the tongue. Facts may be deemed
irrelevant to the phenomena under consideration, but no fact is ever deemed of itself
frivolous, feigned, superfluous to the main theme, or redundant. Scientists and rabbis
treat their respective subject matters as codes composed entirely of meaningful data.’2
Yet even in the realm of science, problems can arise about the relationship between
the intellectual constructions elaborated by scientists and the world of nature on which
they form a commentary. How is it, for example, that mathematical theory, an essential
element of all science, yet spun out of the mathematician's head like a spider's web,
applies so amazingly to the outer world? Why do distant galaxies obey the dictates of
mathematical textbooks? Many theories have been suggested by philosophers of
science, including the instrumentalist view that mathematics is merely a human way of
imposing a useful grid on an indifferent and chaotic world. Whatever view we take, the
escalation of scientific theory in relation to its subject-matter is a topic for enquiry, and
the same problem arises about the relationship between escalating Talmudic enquiry
and its subject matter, the Torah.
We may note also that the similarity between the general aims of scientists and rabbis
results in a strong similarity between the sociological patterns set up by the two
disciplines. Like scientists, rabbis are organised into associations of equal comrades
(chaverim). Any qualified rabbi may challenge the opinion of any other rabbi, however
distinguished3. There is no figure in the Talmudic writings who corresponds to the
figure of Jesus in the Gospels: soaring far above the status of any of his disciples and
contemporaries, and speaking with such authority that argument or criticism is
impossible (unless motivated by malice). Moreover, even though some of the rabbis were
credited with the ability to perform miracles, a rabbi is not permitted to seek to validate
his opinion by the performance of miracles or by special access to heavenly information;
this is regarded as an unfair and unacceptable (see below, the stories of Rabbi Eliezer
and Rabbi Johanan ben Dabachai).
A good example of rabbinic equality is the figure of Rabbi Akiva. He was possibly the
greatest of all the rabbis; one story even portrays him as greater than Moses (see
below). Yet of all the rabbis, he is the most subject to criticism. Stories derogatory of
Rabbi Akiva are a Talmudic genre. The aim of these stories has been a topic of
discussion; some think that they stem from an anti-Akiva faction, possibly opposed to
him for political reasons. More likely, however, these stories (which show, on the whole,
good-natured deprecation rather than hostility) are intended to counter a tendency to
idolise this outstanding rabbi — a tendency that would have damaged the prized
atmosphere of rabbinic equality.
One story tells of Akiva's mistake about the Messianic claimant, Bar Kokhba. Akiva
was so impressed by Bar Kokhba's heroic prowess as a military figure that he said,
‘Surely this is the Messiah.’ He was reproved however by Rabbi Joshua bar Korchah,
who said, ‘Akiva, grass will grow through your cheekbones, and the Messiah will still
have not come’ (y. Ta'anit 4:5, 68d). This is indeed a rather brutal remark, which is
rendered even more brusque by the address of the rabbi as ‘Akiva’, without any title or
respectful formula (but this is a common feature in the anti-Akiva stories). It is
interesting that the Babylonian Talmud does not mention this incident at all; even Bar
Kokhba himself is hardly mentioned, except in dismissive terms. The terrible
disappointment of Bar Kokhba's revolt against Rome, which began with stunning
victories but ended in disaster, was hard to assimilate, and Akiva's support of the
rebellion became part of the disappointment.
Another story about Rabbi Akiva applies criticism not to his political stance but to his
capacity as a practitioner in the field of Aggadah. He offered an interpretation for the
biblical verse that described the Plague of Frogs in Egypt: ‘Then the frog went up and
covered the land of Egypt’ (Exod. 8:2). Rabbi Akiva, struck by the use of the singular
‘frog’ instead of ‘frogs’, said, ‘There was one giant frog and she spawned all the others’.
To this another rabbi, Rabbi Eleazar ben Azariah made the somewhat contemptuous
rejoinder, ‘Akiva, why don't you stick to the laws of purity, and leave aggadah alone?’
This rabbi then went on to offer his own interpretation: ‘First came one frog, and she
croaked to summon all the others’ (Exod. R. Ve'era 10, b. Sanh. 67b). Why this
interpretation is so acceptable and Akivah's so contemptible is rather hard to say,
especially as another rabbi, Rabbi Eleazar ben Arak held the same opinion as R. Akivah
without incurring scorn (b. Sanh. 67b). Rashi on Exod. 8:2 seems to have had access to
another aggadic reading, ‘First came one frog, and they struck it until it produced
swarms and swarms.’ Finally, Rashi himself offers the plain (peshat)) interpretation that
the word ‘frog’ here is a collective noun. The whole topic is obscure and textually
uncertain, but it is clear that Akiva was open game for attack by aggadists.
This incident is also puzzling, since it cannot be the case that Akiva was regarded as
just a narrow legal specialist, since he was famous for his mastery of mysticism (as
recounted in the incident of the Pardes,(b. Hag. 14b), and indeed was made the hero of
mystical texts in later years. Yet here we have Akiva being told to back away from
making contributions to aggadah, for which, it is implied, he had no talent. It is clear
that there was no inhibition about criticizing Akiva, despite his fame. Mysticism and
aggadah are not quite the same thing, though both require something more than
meticulous learning. But the special poetic talent needed for aggadah was something
Akiva was thought to lack.
The most striking anti-Akiva story of all is that of his defeat in argument by an
unknown scholar, Jonathan ben Hyrcanus. Here Akiva was beaten on his own ground, in
regular legal argument:
 Three rabbis journeyed to the house of Rabbi Dosa ben Hyrcanus — Rabbi Joshua, Rabbi Eleazar ben Azariah and
Rabbi Akiva — and stood by the door. Rabbi Dosa's maidservant went in and said to him, ‘Rabbi, the Wise Men of
Israel have come to see you.’
He said to her, ‘Let them enter.’ And they entered.
Rabbi Dosa grasped Rabbi Joshua's hand and seated him on a couch of gold.
Said Rabbi Joshua, ‘Rabbi, tell your other disciple to sit.’
‘Who is he?’
‘Rabbi Eleazar ben Azariah.’
Said he, ‘And has our comrade, Azariah, a son? …’ And he seized him by the hand and seated him on a couch of
gold.
Said Rabbi Joshua, ‘Rabbi, tell your other disciple to sit.’
‘And who is he?’
‘Akiva ben Joseph’.
He said to him, ‘Are you Akiva ben Joseph, whose name goes from one end of the world to the other? Sit, my
son, sit. May your like increase in Israel.’
They began to lead him on in the discussion of laws, until they reached the topic of the ‘co-wife of the
daughter’4. They said to him, ‘The co-wife of the daughter, what is her law?’
He said, ‘It is a point of disagreement between the House of Shammai and the House of Hillel.’
‘According to whom is the Halakhah?’
He said, ‘The Halakhah is according to the House of Hillel.’
They said to him, ‘Is it not said in your name that the Halakhah is according to the House of Shammai?’
He said to them, ‘Did you hear this said in the name of “Dosa” or in the name of “the son of Hyrcanus”?’
They said to him, ‘By our life, Rabbi, we heard it inexplicitly.’

He said to them, ‘I have a younger brother. He is the first-born of Satan5 and his name is Jonathan. He is of the
disciples of Shammai, and take care he does not smite you with Halakhahs, for he has 300 reasons why the co-
wife of the daughter is permitted. But I call heaven and earth to witness that on this seat sat Haggai the prophet
and said … that the co-wife of the daughter is forbidden.’
When they went in, they went in by one door, but when they went out, they went out by three doors [for fear of
meeting Jonathan]. Yet he [Jonathan] caught up with Rabbi Akiva, and plied him with questions and defeated him
in argument.
Said Jonathan, ‘You are Akiva ben Joseph, whose name goes from one end of the world to the other. Happy are
you that you have acquired a name. Yet you have still not reached the status of those who herd cattle.’
‘No,’ said Rabbi Akiva, ‘not even to that of those who herd sheep.’
(b. Yevamot 16a).

From this episode, especially from the graceful exchange of courtesies, we see that the
equality of the rabbis is based on a deep mutual respect, which structures a dignified
form of comradeship. Equality does not mean acquiescence in general mediocrity, but a
keen rivalry and a concern for one's reputation; yet a successful rival can arouse one's
admiration and friendship. All these features parallel the structure of modern science in
its aspect of personal and professional relations between scientists. This is not to deny
that an element of envy may sometimes creep in, and something of this may be detected
in the stories told against Akiva. Yet even the story of Akiva's defeat ends with his
generous acknowledgment of his rival, and so contributes to the general picture of
friendly intellectual struggle.
At the same time, the stories of the word-battles of the rabbis have something in
common with the Greek and Scandinavian stories of the combats of heroes. This tale of
the defeat of the great Akiva in a casual encounter reminds us of the Norse tale of the
defeat of Thor, the strongest of the gods, in a chance encounter with a stranger. The
moral is the inexhaustibility of the world, which contains resources that we know
nothing of; all our prided knowledge, including our gradings of prowess, can be
overturned in a moment. Such stories can be paralleled in the annals of science by tales
of unexpected success by unknowns.
At the end of the story, Jonathan derides Akiva as below the status of ‘one who herds
cattle’. This somewhat cryptic remark is probably a reference to the efforts of the
Rabbis to impose discipline on all the Wise Men, even mavericks like Jonathan who
refused to obey majority decisions. Jonathan is saying to Akiva, ‘You cannot herd the
Wise Men like cattle.’ Akiva replies ruefully, ‘I can't herd sheep, never mind cattle,’ i.e.
he has difficulties even with lesser men than Jonathan. Since Akiva began life as a
shepherd, there is an extra irony in this exchange; as if Jonathan is telling Akiva to go
back to the day job, for which he is barely adequate.
 Discipline is a perennial problem of equality. If all are equal, how are we to come to a
decision when opinions differ? The rabbinic solution was majority decision in Council,
after which the individual was expected to toe the line (even though he might continue
to hold his dissident opinion in private). This is not essentially different from the way in
which disagreements are settled among modern scientists, though the urgent practical
need for a working decision is not so strong for scientists as it is for rabbinic legal
decisors, for whom therefore discipline is more of a desideratum. The deputation of
rabbis who went to discipline the revered Rabbi Dosa (with fear and embarrassment)
found he was innocent of insubordination. It was his brother, Jonathan, ‘the first-born of
Satan’, who had defied the council of the Sages by proclaiming his own decision.
Jonathan had the better of the argument, but that was not the point. Even if he was right
in substance, he was wrong in approach. Submission to the due process of law was more
important than getting the law right, an insight that has played an all-important part in
the development of modern democracy, and in all organisations based on equality.
When Rabbi Dosa, however, confirmed the decision of the Council by his testimony
derived by tradition from the prophet Haggai, this may seem inconsequential. If majority
decision is decisive, why appeal to tradition? One answer to this question might be in
terms of ‘traditionalism’ and ‘anti-traditionalism’ as two opposing trends in rabbinic
thought. This is the theory argued forcibly by Menachem Fisch (though he does not
discuss the present story in its light). Personally, I have considerable doubt about the
existence of the suggested two trends in rabbinic thought. In the present instance
(which also throws light on other instances), tradition and non-tradition are simply two
aspects of a single viewpoint. Rabbi Dosa accepts the Council's decision on
constitutional grounds, but he also happens to have a personal tradition that confirms
the outcome of the council's deliberations. He is saying, ‘Tell the Council not to worry
about their decision; they have made no mistake, for there is independent prophetic
authority for the very same conclusion.’ It is clear that Rabbi Dosa is not urging this
prophetic authority as the chief ground for his acceptance of the decision; for otherwise,
he would not mention that the matter had been matter for dispute between the House of
Hillel and the House of Shammai; these Houses, evidently, did not have the prophetic
ruling before them, and Rabbi Dosa is aware of this, and portrays their dispute as
soluble by regular voting procedures. The tradition from Haggai, therefore, plays no
part in the argument, except as a comfort and encouragement for the normal process of
decision, and a bulwark against the uncomfortably strong arguments of the dissident
Jonathan. Here we find a relatively mild version of what became in Christianity the
dogma of ‘the infallibility of the Church’. Rabbis in Council made decisions, and were
well aware that these decisions were fallible. But every now and then, it became known
to them (or it came to be believed) that the decision they had reached by pure human
argument was identical with a decision earlier vouchsafed by prophetic inspiration. This
kind of confirmation gave them encouragement, though by no means total confidence in
their conclusions.
I now turn to another even more famous story, that of the most formidable dissident of
all, Rabbi Eliezer (a more titanic version of Jonathan, ‘the first-born of Satan’), which
contains the same ingredients in even more remarkable form, and casts even more light
on the rabbinic theory of how to arrive at truth through discussion and consent.
1
For criticism of these terms see Maccoby (1993).
2Fisch(1997), p. 56.
3The question of challenge between one generation of rabbis and a previous generation
is more vexed, and will be considered later.
4If a man dies childless, his brother is enjoined to marry the widow (levirate marriage,
Deut. 25:5–10). This cannot happen, obviously, if the widow is his own daughter
(which can arise because daughter-uncle marriages are permitted). But suppose the
dead man had two wives, both childless; may he marry the co-wife? Or does the incest-
ban extend to the co-wife even though she is not his daughter? In the majority opinion,
she was forbidden; but in the minority opinion, she was permitted.
5This expression is not a total condemnation, but rather a playful expression of
disapproval of an obstinate person.
 13
THE DAY GOD LAUGHED

The story that raises the problem of rabbinic epistemology at its most acute is that of
the dissidence of Rabbi Eliezer. This remarkable humanistic story (which was
condemned as blasphemous and imbecilic by Christian spokesmen in a medieval
Christian-Jewish Disputation1) has been much discussed in recent years2.
On that day, Rabbi Eliezer put forward all the arguments in the world3, but the Sages did not accept them.
Finally, he said to them, ‘If the halakhah is according to me, let that carob-tree prove it.’
He pointed to a near-by carob-tree, which then moved from its place a hundred cubits, and some say, four
hundred cubits.
They said to him, ‘One cannot bring a proof from the moving of a carob-tree.’
Said Rabbi Eliezer, ‘If the halakhah is according to me, may that stream of water prove it.’
The stream of water turned and flowed in the opposite direction.
They said to him, ‘One cannot bring a proof from the behaviour of a stream of water.’
Said Rabbi Eliezer, ‘If the halakhah is according to me, may the walls of the House of Study prove it.’
The walls of the House of Study began to bend inwards. Rabbi Joshua then rose up and rebuked the walls of the
House of Study. ‘If the students of the Wise argue with one another in halakhah,’ he said, ‘what right have you to
interfere?’
In honour of Rabbi Joshua, the walls ceased to bend inwards, but in honour of Rabbi Eliezer, they did not
straighten up, and they remain bent to this day.
Then said Rabbi Eliezer to the Sages, ‘If the halakhah is according to me, may a proof come from Heaven.’
Then a heavenly voice went forth, and said, ‘What have you to do with Rabbi Eliezer? The halakhah is according
to him in every place.’
Then Rabbi Joshua rose up on his feet, and said, ‘“It is not in the heavens (Deut. 30:12)”.’
What did he mean by quoting this? Said Rabbi Jeremiah, 'He meant that since the Torah has been given already
on Mount Sinai, we do not pay attention to a heavenly voice; for Thou has written in Thy Torah, ‘Decide according
to the majority (Exod. 23:2).’
Rabbi Nathan met the prophet Elijah. He asked him, ‘What was the Holy One, Blessed by He, doing in that
hour?’
Said Elijah, ‘He was laughing, and saying, “My children have defeated me, my children have defeated me.”’
(b. Bava Metzia, 59b)

Menachem Fisch characterizes this story as the apex of Talmudic anti-traditionalism.

Rabbi Eliezer, Fisch notes, was the archtraditionalist, who boasted that he had never
taught a doctrine that he had not learnt from his teachers. Yet his doctrine in this
instance was rejected, which shows that the rabbis, led by Rabbi Joshua, preferred to
arrive at a conclusion through discussion, rather than by reference to tradition. Even
when Eliezer's teaching was confirmed by miracles, and even, finally, by God Himself,
the assembled rabbis stood by their reasoned majority-vote conclusion, urging that God
had sanctioned human discussion by saying (in the Torah) that the Torah is ‘not in
Heaven’ and had long ago resigned His right to interfere with the process of human
decision-making. God was therefore ruled out of order. Rather than reacting angrily to
this daring proceeding, God was pleased. Like a good parent, he was delighted to see
his children demonstrating their ability to get on without Him and even to stand up to
Him by holding Him to the principles of autonomy which He had given them.
Far from being ‘imbecilic’, this story is both daring and profound. It is the definitive
rejection of any doctrine of ‘the infallibility of the Church’. The Jewish religious
community acknowledges that when it faces problems, it does so by the power of the
human intellect and moral sensibility. This means that it may make mistakes, but this
does not matter. Objectively, Rabbi Eliezer was right, but it is more important that the
community should reach its own conclusions than that it should be objectively right. It is
also important that conclusions once reached should be obeyed by the community under
the rule of law. Such obedience is not subservience but the operation of community self-
rule. Anyone who defies this rule is opting for fascism, even if he has a direct line to
inspiration.
Rabbi Eliezer was claiming a kind of prophetic authority, validated by miracles and
divine oracle, and the rabbis rejected this claim not because they did not believe in the
existence of prophecy, but because they did not want it as their current source of
authority. The rabbis believed that the age of prophecy had ended at the time when the
biblical canon closed with the last of the prophets, Malachi. Yet this did not mean that
they had entered an iron age of mediocrity. In some ways, they even dared to say, rabbis
were superior to prophets. For while prophets received the Law, rabbis made it.
Of course, this was the basis of Christian polemics against rabbinic Judaism, which
was accused of having substituted ‘legalism’ for prophetic inspiration, which survived,
allegedly, in the intertestamental apocalyptic writings to be taken up in Christianity. But
so-called ‘legalism’ was very often a concern for rationalism and human values. The
prophet was a vehicle for ecstatic communication, not for consultation, discussion and
decision. The rabbis did not deny the existence of charismatic gifts short of prophecy
even in their own times; such figures as Hanina ben Dosa and Honi the Circlemaker
were revered as having a special relationship with God, but they played no part in the
Councils at which important practical decisions were made. These required cooperation
between equal intellects, working out together, like scientists, the implications of the
Torah. The rejection of Rabbi Eliezer's miracles was a conscious decision to rely on a
scientific method.
The question may be asked, however, what exactly was the line of contention between
Rabbi Eliezer and the other rabbis, led by Rabbi Joshua. Rabbi Eliezer resorted to
miracles only as a last resort. He did not at first seek to impose his will by prophetic fiat,
but on the contrary, put forward ‘all the arguments in the world’. This makes me feel
somewhat doubtful of Menachem Fisch's interpretation of the story. He sees Rabbi
Eliezer as representative of the ‘traditionalist’ school which believed that teachings
should be accepted only if evidence could be found that they had been handed down
from an unimpeachable source. On this view, Rabbi Eliezer's arguments were all
evidential; he confined himself to presenting evidence that his view on the topic under
discussion derived from strong early authority. His arguments, in that case, cannot have
been long in the presenting: such a narrow brief does not appear to fit the description
‘all the arguments in the world’. The narrative itself does not say explicitly that Rabbi
Eliezer appealed to earlier authority; if this is really the main fulcrum of the story, this
omission is inexplicable. Menachem Fisch's scenario is really based on extraneous
information (about Eliezer as the arch-traditionalist) and this is allowed to influence his
interpretation of our present passage. But (as has often been pointed out) the picture
given in some sources of Eliezer as totally traditionalist is inconsistent with other
sources in which he is portrayed as engaging in a priori argument just like any other
rabbi (e.g. M. Peah 5:2, M. Peah 7:7, Demai 6:3), rather than simply appealing to earlier
authority4. I think we must interpret our present passage entirely on its own merits,
rather than judging it in the light of a preconceived identikit of Eliezer5.
If so, we must conclude that the point of the story is not to present a conflict between
traditionalism and anti-traditionalism. It is to present dramatically the problem
presented by the rabbinic principle of majority decision. The essence of this principle is
that it is a cutting of the Gordian knot. Discussion and debate can go on for ever, and
never reach a unanimous conclusion. It is a heuristic axiom that human enquiry cannot
ever reach finality (this is the Popperian principle that the rabbis, as Fisch argues so
convincingly, maintained). In science, final positive decision is not essential: it is
sufficient that interim hypotheses can be tested by falsification. But in law, practical
decision cannot be held in suspension; a decision must be reached, because no-decision
is also a decision. Therefore the process of discussion must be cut short at some point
by a vote, provided, of course, all discussants agree to stand by the outcome. In order to
agree on this, all participants must temper their own self-conviction sufficiently to be
prepared to accept, in practice, a contrary view, even though they may continue, in
private, to hold their own view. This means that contrary views, in some sense, must be
entertained simultaneously, if only to the extent that participants must consider that the
adoption of a view contrary to their own would not be a disaster. This is the meaning of
the rabbinic principle (about contrary views), ‘These and these are the words of the
living God (b. Eruvin 13b, b. Gittin 6b).’ (This formula is typical of the Jewish democratic
propensity to upgrade instead of downgrading; instead of saying ‘All opinions are
equally human, therefore fallible’, it is said, ‘All opinions are equally divine, therefore
acceptable’; this does not imply the logical absurdity that A and not-A are equally true,
but that the proponents of both A and not-A have an equal God-given right to hold their
view).
Rabbi Eliezer was so convinced that he was right that he refused to accept the
majority vote that went against him. This is what made him resort to extra-constitutional
methods to convince his colleagues. He hoped, no doubt, that after experiencing the
miracles he had invoked, his colleagues would withdraw their opinions and finally the
vote would be be with him after all. He could hardly have wished to abolish the whole
principle of majority vote, which was believed by all to have Toranic sanction. But he
wished to influence the majority vote by methods that transcended rabbinic argument,
and which flouted the principle, ‘It is not in Heaven’. Rabbi Joshua summed up the true
process of argument when he used the phrase ‘ … the students of the Wise argue with
one another in halakhah’. The word he used for ‘argue’ (menatzechim) means literally
‘contend for victory’6. Rabbi Eliezer wished to take the element of battle, or equal
contention, out of the debate, and this would make the concept of majority vote
meaningless. He wished to turn the process of voting into the mere employment of a
rubber stamp. That is why Rabbi Joshua interpreted Rabbi Eliezer's intervention as an
attack on the concept of majority vote. God Himself did not want a rubberstamp Council.
Fisch takes the view that Eliezer's motive in resorting to miracles was to give final
convincing proof of his own access to authoritative tradition. I would urge rather that
his motive was to give final ratification to the arguments which he had put forward and
which had failed to convince his colleagues on the rational level. There does not seem to
me to be any evidence in the story that Eliezer was appealing to authoritative tradition
at all. He was saying, ‘If you can't accept my arguments, then please accept the
evidence of your own eyes that I speak with a supernatural force that is beyond all
argument.’ To this their reply was, ‘There is no supernatural force that supersedes
rational argument. God Himself has handed over the power of decision to the rabbis
conducting debate on rational lines.’
Another passage that turns on the rabbis' lack of concern with supernatural proof is
the following:
Rabbi Jochanan ben Dahabai said, ‘Four things were told to me by the Ministering Angels: Why are children born
lame? because their parents had intercourse from the rear. Why are children born blind? because their parents
gazed at each other's genitals. Why are they born dumb? because they kissed each other's genitals. Why are they
born deaf? because they talked while having intercourse.’
However, Rabbi Jochanan (bar Nappacha) said, ‘These are the words of Rabbi Jochanan ben Dahabai. But the
Sages say, ‘The Halakhah is not in accordance with Jochanan ben Dahabai; but anything that a man wants to do
with his wife, he may do’
(b. Nedarim 20b).

There is no record of a Council or a majority vote here; but the Sages simply ruled out
the testimony of Rabbi Jochanan ben Dahabai despite its alleged supernatural origin.
Did they regard him as a fraud? Probably not; as a charismatic, he was credited with
genuine communications from the Ministering Angels. But such communications were
simply out of order; they did not qualify as legal evidence that could influence rabbinic
decisions. As the story of Rabbi Eliezer shows, even a communication from God Himself
did not qualify.
It is certainly not the case that the rabbis discounted the existence of charismatic gifts
among members of their movement. On the contrary, many stories are told of
miraculous deeds performed by rabbis; so much so, that some scholars (e.g. Jacob
Neusner) have even made these stories central in the self-image of the movement. This,
however, makes it even more remarkable that charismatic gifts are marginalised in the
way that they are, when it comes to what the rabbis prized most, the administration and
development of Torah. Not a single halakhic decision in the whole rabbinic corpus can
be attributed to a claim of divine inspiration, and all attempts to solve halakhic problems
by charismatic means were rejected. This trend is even continued into the Middle Ages,
when despite the awesome mystic power attributed by many rabbis to the Zohar, it was
never given halakhic authority in preference to the Talmud.
It may be said that even charismatic or mystical gifts did not amount to an actual gift
of prophecy such as was possessed by the biblical prophets. Did the biblical prophets (in
rabbinic theory) have the power of legal decision through prophetic inspiration, or did
they have to bow to the majority decisions of the Councils of their day? Certainly Moses
would have to be regarded as the exception, since it was through his prophetic gift that
the Torah was transmitted to mankind in the first place; but later prophets, in rabbinic
theory, did not have the right to add to the Torah given through Moses. Moreover, there
are many rabbinic passages which convey that the post-Moses prophets did not even
have the right to decide halakhic problems arising from the Torah on their own, or by
personal consultation with God. They are regarded as functioning as Chairman of the
Council of their day, much like Rabban Gamaliel or Rabbi Judah the Prince; their
prophetic gift came into play not for legislative purposes, but for transmitting warnings,
moral rebukes and messages of future consolation.7
The legislative Council, then, by its power of decision through majority vote, has wide
discretion and can come to decisions which are arrived at by rational (therefore fallible)
discussion. Such decisions, as time goes on, will build up into a legal structure that may
be very different from the starting-system. Questions now arise about how development
and change can play a part in a religious schema that begins as divinely inspired and
unchangeable. This is the important problem that Menachem Fisch handles in his
portrayal of what he calls the two outlooks in rabbinic thought: ‘traditionalism’ versus
‘anti-traditionalism’. Though, in my view, the story of Rabbi Eliezer is not an instance of
this conflict8, but contains a conflict on the different topic of majority voting, there is
indeed a tension between the two outlooks in rabbinic literature, which may be found
illustrated in other stories. In general, the traditionalist view may be defined as the view
that change occurs only when some lacuna in the exegesis of the Torah needs to be
filled (either because part of the exegesis has been forgotten, or because a new situation
has arisen not covered by previous legislation), while the anti-traditionalist view is that
change continually takes place as a consequence of new thinking and ‘trouble-shooting’
of old thinking — not that the Torah itself is subject to change, but its exegesis is subject
to constant development, and not even the most eminent figures in the history of this
exegesis are immune from criticism.
Perhaps the most startling story illustrative of the anti-traditionalist view is that of
Moses and Rabbi Akiva.
Said R. Yehuda in the name of Rav: when Moses ascended on high, he found the Almighty busy affixing coronets
to the letters (of the Torah).
‘Lord of the Universe, who is delaying you?’ asked Moses.
He said: ‘There is a man who will arise at the end of many generations, Akiva son of Joseph is his name, who will
derive from each tip heaps and heaps of laws.’
‘Lord of the Universe,’ Moses asked, ‘show him to me.’
‘Turn around,’ the Almighty replied.
On this Moses found himself sitting at the end of the eighth row (of R. Akiva's academy). He did not know what
they were saying, and his strength ebbed away.
When Akiva reached a certain topic, his pupils asked him, ‘Teacher, whence do you derive this?’
He replied, ‘It is “a law of Moses from Mount Sinai”.’
At this, Moses' mind was put at rest.

This story depicts Moses projected more than a thousand years ahead by time travel. He
arrives at the academy of Rabbi Akiva, listens to the lecture and the students' responses
and finds himself lost. He cannot understand a word of the discussion. Only when he
hears his name mentioned in connection with a certain law, does he receive comfort
from the thought that his influence on Jewish law is still important.
The statement that Rabbi Akiva's new laws are derived from the ‘crowns’ or ‘tips’ that
decorate the Hebrew letters of the Torah is a kind of satirical exaggeration. Actually, no
such derivations are to be found in the records of Akiva's legal activities or those of any
other Talmudic rabbi9. What Akiva did use for legal inferences were not such trivial
calligraphic decorations but actual linguistic features of the text ignored by others: for
example, the particles 'et (signifying the accusative case to follow) and 'akh (meaning
‘only’), and the apparently superfluous use of vav (‘and’).
Indeed, it is worth considering the possibility that this story was originally intended
not as extravagant praise for Rabbi Akiva (which is how it has always been understood
by commentators), but as a satire on his exegetical methods. As we have seen (p. 170)
Akiva was not without his critics. In particular, his way of treating biblical texts by close
attention to verbal minutiae met with opposition. His great opponent in this respect was
Rabbi Ishmael, whose dictum, ‘The Torah speaks in human language’ (b. Keritot 11a),
was intended to assert the need for attention to Hebrew idiom, and specifically to
counter R. Akiva's unnatural hermeneutic style. A striking instance of this
methodological clash is to be found in the following exchange:
Rabbi Akiva interpreted a superfluous vav (‘and’) in a biblical verse to mean that a priest's daughter, found guilty
of adultery, should be executed by fire. Rabbi Ishmael said to him, ‘Shall we impose a penalty of death by fire
because you interpret a superfluous vav?’
(b. Sanhedrin 51b).

It will be seen that Akiva met with opposition not only in the field of aggadah (see p.
167) but even in his own special field of halakhah. If we read the story of Moses's time-
travel as a satire emanating from Akiva's halakhic opponents, it makes perfect sense.
The message is, ‘Akiva thinks he can improve on Moses. He interprets meaningless
particles in order to elicit laws that Moses never heard of. He might just as well try to
elicit laws from the flourishes on the top of the letters.’ The sheer surrealist fantasy of
the whole story points to a satirical motive10; one is reminded of Aristophanes's farcical
treatment of Socrates11.
Traditionalist commentators, taking the story literally and dismayed by the portrayal
of Akiva as knowing more than Moses, have pointed out that the scene of Moses
ascending on high to receive the Torah must have occurred before the Torah was given.
Moses, therefore, was naturally ignorant of the content of the Torah at this point, and
Akiva's superior knowledge is thus explicable without resort to a theory of an escalation
of Toranic development beyond Moses' time and beyond his ken. To counter this
argument, Menachem Fisch has suggested that the story deals with Moses' second
ascent, after the Golden Calf incident. If the story is a satire, however, this suggestion is
somewhat beside the point. Far from being a shocking instance of anti-traditionalism,
the story is a satirical attack on the innovations and aspirations of Rabbi Akiva. Moses is
not being portrayed as ignorant of the Torah, but rather Akiva is being criticised as a
know-all who thinks wrongly that he knows more than Moses. As for the contention that
Moses must have been ignorant since he had not yet received the Torah, this runs
counter to the often-expressed rabbinic conviction that detailed knowledge of the Torah
existed even before it was officially given.
Nevertheless, even if the story is read as (originally at least) a satire on Akiva, it still
gives evidence of a conflict between two trends, traditionalism and anti-traditionalism,
with Akiva being criticised by the satirist, whoever he was, as the arch-representative of
the innovators. Fisch is undoubtedly right in seeing that such a controversy existed. To
see its extent, let us now turn to some prominent and uninhibited expressions of the
traditionalist view.
‘Rabbi Joshua ben Levi said: Scripture, Mishnah, Talmud and Aggadah, even what a distinguished student would
pronounce in the future before his teacher, were already said to Moses on Mount Sinai’
(y. Peah, 2:4, 17a; see also b. Berakhot 5a, b. Megillah 19b).

This appears to say that the whole of the Oral Torah was revealed to Moses at Sinai.
This would leave no room for development whatever. Any discussion would only be
required because some of the Oral Torah had been forgotten and thus needed to be
recovered through ratiocination.
Yet the very extravagance of this statement gives rise to doubts about how literally it
was intended to be taken. Does it really mean that the whole text of the Mishnah was
revealed to Moses word-for-word, including the many disagreements between various
named rabbis, such as Rabbi Meir and Rabbi Judah? Was it revealed to Moses that
Rabbi Eliezer would be voted down by majority vote on the question of Achnai's oven?
Was it revealed to Moses that many controversies would take place because of the
erosion of the memory of what was revealed to Moses? The whole conception gives rise
to logical absurdities and confusion of categories. Moreover (a very important
consideration), if taken seriously this statement would destroy the distinction between
Toranic (deoraita) and rabbinical (derabbanan) laws. This distinction pervades the whole
corpus of rabbinic writings, and it assumes that rabbinical laws are man-made, not
revealed by God.
Rabbi Joshua ben Levi even includes ‘Talmud’ among the elements of Oral Torah
revealed to Moses. At the time of Rabbi Joshua ben Levi, neither the Palestinian nor the
Babylonian Talmud had yet been compiled, though the kind of discussion of the Mishnah
which would later be recorded in the Talmuds had already begun. The meaning of
‘Talmud’ to Rabbi Joshua ben Levi was simply ‘present and future discussion of the
Mishnah up to the end of time’ — for he certainly did not envisage ‘Talmud’ as a mode of
discussion that would ever come to an end. What the rabbi was saying, then, was, ‘All
informed discussion of the Torah, up to the end of time, was already present to Moses at
Sinai.’ This very general meaning is emphasised by the inclusion of the most fluid form
of discussion of all, ‘what a distinguished (qualified, vatiq) student would pronounce
before his teacher in the future’. This is not discussion that has found its way into
publication, but the give-and-take of the lecture-room and seminar, the raw dialogue out
of which published texts emerge. This gives the clue to what Rabbi Joshua ben Levi is
really saying, which is that all future discussion of the Torah was present in potentia at
the time of the Revelation. This is like saying that the seed of all future scientific
development was present in the minds of the first mathematicians and scientists such as
Pythagoras or Archimedes. The founding of the method and its embodiment in a
dedicated cadre of trained, qualified persons was sufficient to ensure all the subsequent
development up to the present day and beyond. This is a vision of the unity of science
which all scientists find inspiring, and Rabbi Joshua provides a similar vision in relation
to the enterprise of the Torah.
It may even be questioned, then, how far this vision is really ‘traditionalist’. It can be
regarded, on the contrary, as a sanction for progress and change. Of course, the passage
has been used by traditionalists of various crude kinds to support total canonization of
the rabbinic texts. It has been used by advocates of complete stasis in Judaism, in
oblivion of the rabbinic warnings against this (such as the story of Rabbi Eliezer, with its
insistence on the fallibility and provisionality of rabbinic decisions). But the saying of
Rabbi Joshua ben Levi, in itself, does not validate such a conservative interpretation. It
should be regarded, in fact, as a message of comfort to those who endorse change,
saying, ‘Do not worry about your innovations, because every informed development in
Judaism, however apparently revolutionary, was potentially existent in the revelation
given to Moses.’
Indeed, it is characteristic of revolutionary movements to seek validation in the distant
past. The leaders of the French Revolution saw themselves as reviving the glories of the
Roman Republic. The Diggers, in England, saw themselves as reverting to an
equalitarian past, ‘when Adam delved and Eve span.’ The rabbinic movement, with all its
insistence that ‘the Torah is not in heaven’, saw itself as fulfilling the ancient vision of
Moses. Even when they ruled God out of order in the rabbinical Council, they were
adhering to Moses' God-given instructions about the supremacy of majority decision.
Thus the conflict between traditionalism and anti-traditionalism is not entirely clear-
cut. A kind of traditionalism can serve the purposes of anti-traditionalism12. Stories that
have been cited as expressions of this conflict turn out to be ambiguous. I think that
what is needed is an exploration of how traditionalism and anti-traditionalism, in
rabbinic thought, can be two sides of the same coin.
We need to consider further, however, the question of the canonization of the rabbinic
writings. The Mishnah did achieve a kind of canonization; yet it was of a kind that differs
radically from that of the Bible itself. What was this Mishnaic kind of canonization, and
how can it be reconciled with the Talmudic doctrine of rabbinic fallibility, as enshrined
in the story of Rabbi Eliezer and in the whole concept of majority decision? If the
Mishnah is a record of rabbinic disagreements and majority decisions, how can it be a
canonical work?
The Mishnah, in its style, actually takes great pains not to have the air of a canonical
work. In contrast, say, to the Dead Sea Scrolls, it uses no imperatives to issue its
instructions, but instead uses participles, as if to say, ‘This is the way one behaves.’ This
tone is set right from the beginning, with the quiet opening, 'From what time does one
recite the shema ‘?’; practice is described rather than prescribed. The whole aim is to
avoid the tone of a canonical, Godinspired work.
Yet a sort of canonization set in, in the sense that the successors of the tanna'im, the
Mishnaic authorities, i.e. the 'amoraim of the Talmud, regarded themselves as not
having the right to disagree with their predecessors. This is a canonization not just of
the Mishnah, but of the whole tannaitic literature, including the Halakhic Midrashim
and the Baraitot. The whole Talmudic commentary on the Mishnah (Gemara) is based on
the assumption that only a tanna may disagree with a tanna; an amora can be refuted
simply by pointing out that there is a tannaitic statement contrary to his view.
Yet on closer inspection, as Menachem Fisch brilliantly proves, this convention is
largely a sham. If an amora really wants to disagree with a tanna, there are many ways
in which he can do so. He can re-interpret the tanna's words so that the disagreement
disappears. Or he can carry out some textual emendation, so that the tannaitic
statement does not contradict him after all. There are even bolder resources. In effect,
the rule of canonization does not act as a bar to amoraic innovation. Yet the pretence is
sedulously kept up that an amora never contradicts a tanna. Fisch is puzzled about this,
and offers the explanation that the Mishnah acts like a textbook, which is given to
students to master and memorise, and criticised only when they graduate to full status
as scientific researchers, when they are at liberty to throw away the ladder by which
they ascended. In the outcome, however, this was not understood, and later scholars
swallowed the traditionalist line that the tannaim were to be treated as sacrosanct. This
resulted in the canonization of the Mishnah, with some deleterious effects on the
progress of halakhah.
I would offer a somewhat simpler explanation. I suggest that the matter can be
explained in terms of etiquette. The amoraim, in boundless respect and reverence for
their predecessors the tannaim, adopted as a rule of courtesy the practice of never
contradicting them openly. This is an extension of the halakhah that forbids a student to
contradict his teacher. This courteous practice is really not part of the general topic of
traditionalism versus anti-traditionalism. The latter topic arises from the historical
question, ‘How far is the halakhah the result of innovation, and how far is it the product
of tradition?’, to which various answers were given, the most popular being, ‘Even when
arising from innovation, the halakhah never departs from tradition, since it merely fulfils
already existent trends, or even, at times, resurrects a priori and unconsciously a lost
tradition.’
At the same time, the rabbinic movement, while deferring courteously to earlier
generations, contained trends that contradicted such obsequiousness. It was understood
that a later generation might even be superior to an earlier generation, if only as dwarfs
standing on the shoulders of giants. It was this perception that gave rise to the principle
hilkheta ke-batraia (‘the law is according to the later authority’), a principle that led to
the superior status of the Babylonian Talmud over the Palestinian Talmud. There was
also the principle of the equality of all generations, enshrined in the dictum, ‘Jephtha in
his generation is like Samuel in his generation’ (b. Rosh Hashanah 25b); Jeptha being
the least learned, and Samuel the most learned, of the Judges. The decisions of each
generation were to be respected equally, and it was considered bad practice to make
unfavourable comparisons between one generation and another. This, like many rabbinic
principles of ‘the rule of law’, has its parallel in the theory of parliamentary democracy.
Thus the courteous deference of amoraim to tannaim is not of such ontological
seriousness as to confer serious canonical status on the Mishnah. It is too obvious from
the whole modest, workaday style of the Mishnah that it is not putting itself forward as
an inspired work on the same level as the books of the Bible. On the contrary, it is taking
the utmost pains not to be mistaken for such an inspired work, since the rabbinic
movement held as one of its most basic doctrines that the canon had been closed before
the rabbinic movement began.
The rule that an amora can never be allowed to contradict a tanna overtly, so far from
raising the tannaim to infallible status, has something playful about it. It is a rule of the
Talmudic game, without which the game would be much less enjoyable and interesting.
Part of the pleasure of the game, as Menachem Fisch abundantly proves, lies in the
ingenuity involved in accepting the rule without allowing it to restrict the freedom of the
players to innovate.
My conclusion is that, despite certain appearances to the contrary (expressions of
‘traditionalism’ and intra-generational deference) the rabbinic movement was
remarkably open to innovatory, humanistic reasoning, and its basic watchword remained
the dictum of Rabbi Joshua: ‘It (the Torah) is not in Heaven.’
1See Maccoby (1993), pp. 163–67.
2See Maccoby (1978), pp. 141–3; Fisch (1997), pp. 78–88; Boyarin, (1990), pp. 34–5.
3The topic under discussion was an oven of peculiar construction; was it susceptible to
ritual impurity or not?
4How then should we interpret the much-quoted saying of R. Eliezer, ‘I have never
taught anything that I have not learned from my masters’ (b. Sukk. 28a)? It seems that
there is a deep ambivalence throughout rabbinic literature concerning traditionalism
and anti-traditionalism (see p. 171). Some reconciliation between the two tendencies
was sought by all; an attempt to show the terms on which even R. Eliezer would
accept novelty is found in M. Negaim 9:3, but even this passage does not fully
acknowledge his preparedness for open debate.
5Fisch (pp. 80–82) attempts to make Eliezer's arguments more variegated (thus living up
to the description ‘all the arguments in the world’) while still confining him to the
citing of authorities, by widening the debate to cover many other issues raised on ‘that
day’ (see M. Eduyot). But the story explicitly says that Eliezer used ‘all the arguments
in the world’ on this single issue. Moreover, the word used here for ‘arguments’
(teshuvot) means ‘refutations’ and is used to mean logical counters to reasonings,
never to mean citations of authorities.
6The same verb is used later in the story when God says, ‘My children have defeated
me’. This might also be translated (in the light of Rabbi Joshua's usage), ‘My children
have striven for victory with me.’
7Yet in the story of the rabbinic delegation to Rabbi Dosa ben Hyrcanus (p. 168), the
clincher is that the rabbinic majority decision turns out to be identical with a decision
deriving from the prophet Haggai. Does this mean that a prophetic pronouncement is
after all decisive in law? I do not think so. The derivation from Haggai gives the
decision traditional, rather than prophetic, authority. A halakhah with such awesome
ancestry has a good chance of going back to some very distinguished Sanhedrin,
perhaps even to Moses himself. The prophets, quite apart from having personal
prophetic gifts, are important links in the chain of tradition.
8I do not deny, of course, that the story is a classic expression of anti-traditionalism, but
I cannot see that Eliezer plays the part of a traditionalist opposition in it.
9The flourishes known as tagin attached to certain letters in scrolls of the Law and in
mezuzot and tefillin have been made the subject of mystical teachings in medieval
kabbalistic literature (see especially Sefer Tagin and its kabbalistic commentaries).
This kind of exegesis, however, was directly influenced by the Talmudic story under
discussion, and is not to be found in the Talmudic literature itself. Occasionally,
however, the shapes of the letters, including the tagin, are used allegorically in the
Talmud to inculcate moral lessons (see b. Shabbat 104a). This, however, is very
different from inferring ‘heaps and heaps of laws’. The tag is the ‘tittle’ (keraia)
mentioned in the New Testament (Matthew 5:18; Luke 16:17).
10It is remarkable that no commentator seems to have raised the difficulty that the story
attributes to R. Akiva a mode of exegesis of which we have no examples in the
rabbinic literature.
11The story is transmitted in the name of Rav (Abba Arika) who was certainly no critic of
Akiva, whom he revered as a master of an earlier generation. I suggest, however, that
by the time Rav received the story, its original satirical motivation had been forgotten.
It was at this later stage that the more serious culmination of the story was added,
 including the reference to Akiva's martyrdom.
12It should also be pointed out that anti-traditionalism is not always forward-looking.
There is a kind of rabbinic outlook, very much in evidence in modern times, in which
the more liberal concepts of the Talmud are overruled in favour of reactionary
concepts derived from the medieval authorities known as the Rishonim. This is
especially the case in sexual contexts. The liberal concepts of the Talmud on divorce,
abortion and extra-marital sex have been replaced by narrow and gloomy outlooks
influenced, in historical fact, by Islam and Christianity. The willingness of the Talmud
to use rabbinic powers to counter abuses has been abandoned; prominent examples
are the scandal of the agunah and the discrimination against the mamzer — both of
these abuses could be eliminated by the application of Talmudic methods (see
Appendix B). A more trivial, yet symptomatic, example of reactionary anti-Talmudism
is the recent ultra-Orthodox practice of wearing black clothes, a practice specifically
contra-indicated by the Talmud, which regards black as the colour of disgrace (see b.
Qidd. 30a, b. M. Q 17a, b. B.M. 59b, M. Midd. 5:4).
 14
TALMUDIC LOGIC

The Talmudic study of the Hebrew Bible (Tanakh) consists of the application of logic to
the text. If the text puts forward proposition p, what does this imply? How can this be
reconciled with proposition q (elsewhere in the Hebrew Bible), which at first sight
seems to contradict it? Moreover, why is proposition r included in the text, though it
seems to be redundant, since it can be inferred from some other proposition already
included? This kind of reasoning activity leads to the development of logical rules, by
which the whole research is then controlled. The rabbis developed a system of logic
which is similar in some respects to that developed by the Greeks, notably Aristotle, and
in other significant respects, different. In one respect, the theory of induction, rabbinic
logic has more in common with modern scientific thinking than with the deductive class-
logic of the Greeks.
It will be seen that rabbinic logic is unremittingly textual; that is, it builds on the
presupposition that the text of Tanakh is without logical flaws, contains no redundancies
or anything meaningless (see p. 166 for the similarity of this assumption to the
scientist's approach to Nature). This, of course, is not acceptable to the modern mind,
which regards the Hebrew Bible as the product of human minds, and as replete with
flaws, including illogicalities, just like any other human document of ancient or modern
times. It will be seen, however, that the assumption of biblical perfection can be a great
training-ground for the exercise of the logical faculty. It leads to the assessment of the
text against a formidable array of systematic tests; and in the course of this probing
exercise the rabbis build up a theoretical system that has a permanent place and value
in the history of logic. By the time the rabbis have finished with the text, they have
actually made it (by their re-interpretations) into something very like the unassailably
logical structure that they have assumed from the start.
This application of strict logic applies only to the halakhic (legal) aspect of Tanakh and
especially the Torah (Pentateuch). There is little attempt to apply strict logic to the
poetical and narrative aspects treated in the rabbinic 'aggadah, which tolerates
contradictory approaches and multiple meanings. It is specifically in the area of legal
logic that the rabbis have something individual to contribute to logical theory.
A leading example of the logic of the rabbis is their theory of induction, which they
called binyan av (literally, ‘the building of a father’; ‘father’ here means ‘generalization’,
because it generates particulars by deduction). The question here is, ‘How does the
observation of particular facts lead to the formulation of a general principle, which can
then generate, by deduction, further particulars?’ This is a central question of science,
which has led to much discussion by philosophers of science, notably, in recent times, by
Karl Popper, who made penetrating criticisms of the whole notion of induction1. It is also
an important question in the theory of law. The rabbis observed many particular
statements in the Torah, and wished to know how far these could be generalised into
far-reaching principles.
An example is the following law of the Torah:
And if a man smite the eye of his bondman, or the eye of his bondwoman, and destroy it, he shall let him go free
for his eye's sake. And if he smite out his bondman's tooth, he shall let him go free for his tooth's sake
(Exodus 21:27–8).

This humane law declares that a master who injures his (non-Jewish) slave must give
him his freedom — a law that contrasts strongly with laws of, say, the Romans which
gave a master the right even to kill his slave with impunity.
But can the law be stated so generally? After all, it says explicitly that the right to
freedom arises only from injury to two particular organs, the eye and the tooth. What
about other injuries, such as destruction of a finger or an ear or a nose?
The rabbis' comment is that the law can indeed be generalised to cover all organs by
the reasoning called binyan 'av (induction):
So far I know only about a tooth or an eye, which are specifically mentioned. How do I know about all the other
chief organs? You must build an induction from the two of them
(Mekhilta, Neziqin 9).

The first step is to ask why the Torah gives us two examples, rather than one. The
answer is that inductive reasoning cannot begin with one observation: this is similar to
the scientific principle, ‘one cannot generalise from one instance’. A binyan 'av needs at
least two examples, which must be significantly different from each other, so that one
can be played against the other to produce a generalization. Even two instances which
do not differ significantly are unproductive: the rabbinic maxim is, ‘Two instances which
are identical teach nothing’.
As a scientific analogy, we may take the case of two compound substances both of
which when inserted in a certain liquid turn it red. Let us say that one of the compounds
is sodium chloride, and the other is potassium chloride. Which of the ingredients causes
the effect? Clearly, it must be the chlorine. It cannot be the sodium because potassium
chloride produces the effect without the presence of sodium. It cannot be the potassium
because sodium chloride produces the effect without the presence of potassium. The
common ingredient chlorine must be the active agent, and we can now venture the
generalization that any substance that contains chlorine will produce the same effect.
From just one of the two compounds, we could conclude nothing, for there is no way of
knowing which of the two ingredients involved is producing the effect.
The same kind of reasoning operates in a legal context in the rabbinic binyan 'av. In
the present example, the effect produced is the freeing of the slave. If we were given
only one case, the destruction of the tooth, we would not be able to generalise, because
we might think that the law applies only when the destroyed organ has the possibility of
growing back after being knocked out. If we were given only the destruction of the eye,
we might think that only organs present at birth were to be included in the law of
freeing the slave. Teeth are not present at birth, and might therefore be thought to be
excluded. By being given two instances, we are given a rounded picture: all organs,
whether present at birth or not, whether they can renew themselves or not, are included
in the law. We have excluded characteristics that are not in common between tooth and
eye, and discovered what is truly in common: this common feature is the basis for a
generalisation that brings in many other instances which have the same feature of being
‘organs’2. From only one of the instances, we would not be able to formulate a
satisfactory generalisation. This process of elimination is really the rejection of
unsatisfactory generalisations by the use of contrary instances, and exemplifies Popper's
description of how science proceeds by falsification rather than verification.
But the rabbinic exegesis is also a vindication of the Torah. By giving two instances,
the Torah might seem open to the charge of redundancy. Why give the example of tooth
when you have already given the example of eye? On the contrary, say the rabbis,
without this apparent repetition we would be left in the dark about the scope of the law.
Another example of doubled statement of a law is the following:
When thou comest into thy neighbour's vineyard, then thou mayest eat grapes until thou have enough at thine
own pleasure: but thou shalt not put any in thy vessel.
When thou comest into thy neighbour's standing corn, then thou mayest pluck ears with thy hand; but thou
shalt not move a sickle unto thy neighbour's standing corn
(Deuteronomy 23:25–6).

The rabbis explain this generous law as applying only to employees working in a field,
not to passers-by. It is a human analogy to the law relating to animals: ‘Thou shalt not
muzzle the ox that treadeth out the corn’ (Deut. 25:4).
Here again there appears to be redundancy (why mention both grapes and corn?), but
the rabbis seize on the opportunity to utilize the repetition in terms of a binyan 'av.
Surely the two instances given (vineyard and cornfield) have been inserted in the Torah
in order to give rise to a generalisation, by which the legislation is extended to all
species of growing produce. By playing off the two against each other, irrelevant
characteristics will be discounted, and we will be left with a common characteristic that
can be extended indefinitely into a general law: all growing products (not just grapes
and corn) come under the permission to the worker to eat of the product on which he is
working (see b. Bava Metzia 84a).
The Talmudic discussion of this matter, however, is particularly striking because it
adds an extended criticism of the binyan 'av reasoning at first offered. The rabbis were
aware that inductive reasoning never reaches a fully conclusive result, because there is
always the possibility that some undetected factor has produced the observed
phenomenon. The proposed generalisation or rule is always only a theory, which, as
Popper argued, can be refuted by contrary evidence but never fully proved by
supporting evidence. (The generalization ‘All swans are white’ cannot be proved by
further instances of white swans, however many, but can be disproved by one
observation of a black swan.) In the instance of the vineyard and the cornfield, the
refutations prove too strong, and finally the whole binyan 'av is abandoned, and another
line of reasoning is taken up to prove the desired conclusion (that the permission to the
worker can be extended beyond grapes and corn to every kind of growing product). It
may be asked, then, why the binyan 'av was recorded in the Talmud at all. Since it
proved an abortive line of reasoning, why give it so much space? The answer is clear:
the Talmud wants to give an example of how to test, and if necessary refute, this type of
reasoning. The Talmud is a teaching manual, not a mere list of established conclusions.
This provisional, open-ended character of Talmudic reasoning again shows its affinity to
science.
Another very prominent form of rabbinic reasoning is the qal vachomer, or a fortiori
argument, which in rabbinic hands reached a theoretical complexity and exactness that
it never achieved in Greek thought. Yet this kind of reasoning too had a provisional,
openended quality, for which it has been hailed by Susan Handelman (though perhaps
not with complete justification) as a forerunner of the approach of deconstruction.
The qal va-chomer is a reasoning appropriate to legal enquiry, rather than to natural
science, but this does not mean that it is unscientific. It is a logic of analogy, not of
classes or sets (the subject-matter of Aristotelian logic). It controls the rabbinic basic
legal enquiry, which is to consider different human situations and decide how alike or
unlike they are, and thus how far legal conclusions can be transferred from one
situation to another. The key phrase in qal va-chomer arguments is ‘all the more so’,
introducing a conclusion. If a conclusion is true in a weak situation, it is true ‘all the
more so’ in a strong situation.
To give a simple example: if a moderately good child deserves a sweet, what does a
very good child deserve? Someone might answer, ‘Two sweets’, but this, in rabbinic
thinking, would be wrong. The correct answer is, ‘All the more so, a very good child
deserves one sweet.’ One must not go beyond the terms given in the premises, or one
would be landed in uncertainty. This is the principle known as dayyo (‘sufficient for it’),
and it is this that lifts the qal va-chomer from the status of rhetoric to that of science3.
The a fortiori argument was of course known to Greek and Roman logicians, but the
principle of dayyo, was unknown to them, with the consequence that this type of
reasoning remained for them a mere rhetorical device. It is noteworthy that St. Paul, in
his Epistles, shows a fondness for the a fortiori argument but does not observe the
principle of dayyo, which is one indication that his claim to rabbinic training was
inauthentic4.5
A biblical source was found both for the qal va-chomer argument itself and for the rule
of dayyo. This was the incident of the punishment of Miriam by leprosy, when God
argues as follows: ‘If her father had but spat in her face, would she not be ashamed
seven days? Let her be shut out from the camp seven days, and after that let her be
received in again (Numbers 12:14)’. The argument may be paraphrased as follows: if
offending a father (a relatively light thing) is punished with banishment for seven days,
offending God (a relatively heavy thing) should be punished all the more so with
banishment for seven days. The Torah here provides an impeccable qal va-chomer,
studiously refraining from adding any days to Miriam's punishment beyond the number
yielded by the rule of dayyo.
An example of qal va-chomer argument in rabbinic literature is the following (b. Bava
Metzia 95a). It is stated in Exodus 22:14 that a borrower must pay the value of the
borrowed article to the owner if it is destroyed or (in the case of an animal) dies. But
what if the article or animal is stolen? Scripture does not tell us explicitly, but a qal va-
chomer argument yields the answer, by analogy with the case of a paid guardian:
1. A paid guardian is free from payment if the article is destroyed, but is liable if it is stolen (Exodus 22:10–12).
2. Therefore, all the more so, a borrower, who is liable if the article is destroyed, should be liable if it is stolen.

The literal meaning of qal va-chomer is ‘light and heavy’. The argument only works if
there are two terms, one of which is ‘heavier’ (i.e. stronger) than the other. In this case,
it is established that a borrower is ‘heavier’ (has more responsibility) than a paid
guardian. This is proved from the Torah, but it also may be a matter of common sense. If
you do someone a favour by allowing him the use of your property without payment,
then you expect a higher standard of obligation and of recompense, in case of a disaster,
than from someone who was not receiving a favour, but was merely looking after the
object as a job, without being allowed personal use of the object.
On the other hand, one might argue just the opposite: a person who is being paid to
look after an article should be more vigilant than a person who is not being paid.
This is the kind of refuting argument that is often used in the Talmud, which is by no
means inclined to accept every proposed qal va-chomer argument. In the present case,
the refuting argument would not get very far, since the Torah itself clearly regards the
borrower as more liable than the paid guardian; but in many cases, this is not so clear,
so there is much room for discussion. The qal va-chomer reasoning is open-ended, in
that it depends on a distinction between ‘light’ and ‘heavy’ that is always open to
question. This aspect, however, does not invalidate this type of reasoning, but
differentiates it from the mathematical or logical kind of reasoning, where intuition or
grasp of human values play no part6.
There are also other kinds of doubt that may enter into a qal vachomer reasoning. An
interesting example is this disagreement between Rabbi Tarfon and his fellow-rabbis,
recorded in the Mishnah:
If an ox damaged by ‘horn’ in a public domain, its owner pays half-damages; but if in a private domain, Rabbi
Tarfon says, ‘Full damages’, but the Sages say, ‘Half damages’. Rabbi Tarfon said to them, ‘In the case of ‘foot’
and ‘tooth’ there is leniency in the public domain (no damages imposed) and stringency in the private domain (full
damages): therefore in the case of ‘horn’ where there is stringency in the public domain (half-damages), should
not there be stringency (equal to that of ‘foot’ and ‘horn) in the private domain?’ They answered, ‘It is enough if
the inferred law is as strict as the law from which it is inferred: if ‘horn’ pays half-damages in the public domain, it
should pay the same in the private domain.’
He said to them, ‘My inference is not from ‘horn’ to ‘horn’ but from ‘foot’ to ‘horn’. If in the public domain there
is leniency in the case of ‘foot’ and ‘tooth’ and stringency with ‘horn’, then if there is stringency for ‘foot’ and
‘tooth’ in the private domain, is it not logical that there should be stringency in the private domain for ‘horn’?’
They answered, ‘It is enough if the inferred law is as strict as the law from which it is inferred: if ‘horn’ pays
half-damages in the public domain, it should pay the same in the private domain.’

It should be noted that this argument is not about the validity of the principle of dayyo
in qal va-chomer arguments, as some scholars have mistakenly thought. Both Rabbi
Tarfon and his opponents the Sages accept not only the validity of qal va-chomer, but
also the validity of its limiting principle of dayyo. Where they differ, in this instance, is
how to draw up the list of terms involved in the reasoning. The Sages do not want to
admit ‘foot/tooth’ as one of the two terms in the reasoning (though they still lie in the
background as providing the basis for the light/heavy dichotomy); instead they wish to
confine the main steps of the reasoning to ‘horn’- the two terms involved are ‘horn-in-
the- public-domain’ and ‘horn-in-the-private-domain’.
Rabbi Tarfon, however, wishes to extend the basic reasoning to ‘foot/tooth’ (they may
be regarded as one term, since their law is identical in this context). The two terms of
his reasoning are thus ‘horn’ and ‘foot/tooth’, and the distinction between public and
private domain is applied to both terms. Thus Rabbi Tarfon is not admitting that he is
making an unjustified leap from ‘half-damages’ to ‘whole-damages’ in the case of ‘horn’.
He is moving from ‘whole-damages-in-the-private-domain’ (in the case of ‘foot/tooth) to
‘whole-damages-in-the-private-domain’ (in the case of ‘horn’). The Sages, however, see
something illegitimate about this move, since, in the process, ‘horn’ has been
surreptitiously promoted from ‘half-damages’ to ‘whole-damages’, which appears to be a
breach of the principle of dayyo. We see from this that in a qal va-chomer argument
there may sometimes be an uncertainty arising from the choice of appropriate terms.
This choice of terms may be a matter of intuition, rather than strict logic, and thus one
person's valid qal va-chomer may be another's fallacy. This does not mean that this
method of argument should be condemned as subjective, but only that it belongs to the
area of rationality rather than strict logic. A method of reasoning can be enormously
useful even if it gives rise at times to irreconcilable disagreements7. There is, after all, a
way to reconcile such differences among people who are not too dogmatically attached
to their own opinions — by majority vote. In this instance, the vote went against Rabbi
Tarfon, and he no doubt accepted the decision in practice, though there was nothing to
stop him from continuing to hold his opinion in theory.8
Thus rabbinic logical theory anticipates modern scientific theory in some respects
(especially in the binyan 'av) but in other respects (especially the qal va-chomer) it
enters a region of logic that transcends the usual parameters of Western logic.
1Popper showed that there is no such thing as ‘inductive logic’ as a counterpart to
‘deductive logic’, but that, on the contrary, there is only one kind of logic, namely
deductive logic. The method of science is to observe particular facts, and then intuit
generalizations (‘laws’) from which these facts follow deductively. These intuitions
cannot be arrived at by any logical method, but can be tested logically; those that
survive the tests may be adopted provisionally as the best hypotheses available. It may
be doubted, however, whether Popper demolished the term ‘induction’ altogether (as
he thought); he merely provided an explanation of how induction works. The term
‘induction’ remained necessary to cover the activity of the scientist in seeking to elicit
from observed facts an overarching explanatory theory. Moreover, certain forms of
argument used by scientists in eliminating unsatisfactory theories and arriving at
better theories are still validly described as inductive methods, since nothing quite
corresponds to them in totally deductive or tautological disciplines (logic and
mathematics).
2
Since the common feature discovered is being ‘organs’, this rules out bodily features
that cannot be called organs, e.g. hair: a slave does not gain freedom by having some
of his hair pulled out.
3See Guggenheimer (1967).
4See Maccoby (1986, pp. 64–67).
5It may be argued, however, that the rule of dayyo was less strictly applied in aggadic
than in halakhic discourse, and Paul's thinking should be reckoned as aggadic. But
there were limits even in aggadic discourse, and Paul goes well beyond these limits
(not only by flagrant breach of dayyo, but by introducing whole terms into the
conclusions of his a fortiori arguments that were not present in the premises). See
Appendix A, p. 217, for an apparently flagrant breach of dayyo in a rabbinic text, and
also a less serious breach, demonstrating the limits of laxity in the use of qal
vachomer in aggadic discourse.
6
It is this undetermined character of the qal va-chomer argument that leads Susan
Handelman to see it as in accordance with deconstructionist thinking. However, she
lays no stress on the more formal and strict aspect embodied in the rule of dayo. See
Handelman (1982), pp. 52–57.
7‘The how much more so is a relation of likeness which depends on an if not an is, and
therefore conclusions are always relative and are subject to further interpretation and
application. There are no categorical statements or proofs in a demonstration which
preclude further discussion. The if always remains apparent, and subject to further
revision and extension’ (Susan Handelman, 1982, p. 56).
8The stammaic discussion of the mishnah (b. Bava Qamma, 25a) must be discounted,
since it shows no comprehension of the logical force of the dayyo principle. Instead, it
imagines that the rule is an arbitrary fiat of the Torah, by which the conclusion of a qal
va-chomer reasoning is cut in half (why by precisely a half is not explained). Thus in
the case of Miriam (the proof-text, Numbers 12:14)), it was really to be expected that
God would banish her for 14 days (twice the number of days she would have expected
from an angry human father), but the Torah cut this expected number by half. The
Gemara then explains that Rabbi Tarfon, while acknowledging the rule of dayyo, had a
variant view of it which would excluded the present case (he considered that a qal va-
chomer that yields a result already derivable from other sources is not subject to the
rule of dayyo). This implausible account ignores totally the plain reason which Rabbi
Tarfon himself gives in the Mishnah: that he was using different terms as the basis for
his reasoning from those used by the Sages. It ignores also the fact that Rabbi
Tarfon's expressions in the Mishnah show that he is not arguing that this instance is
exempt from the rule of dayyo, but, on the contrary, that he is bringing it into the rule.
It seems that in the stammaic period (c. 500 CE) the rationale of the dayyo rule,
perfectly understood in earlier times, had been lost. In earlier times, too, the
derivation of the rule from Scripture (if made, which is doubtful) was not intended to
give it the status of an arbitrary fiat, but to give authoritative approval to a
deliverance of reason. Unfortunately, medieval commentators on the Mishnah
reproduce the stammaic discussion (see Talmudic Encyclopaedia (Hebrew), s.v. dayyo
lav'o min ha-din lihyot ke-nidun). Heinrich Guggenheimer (1967, pp. 181–85) gives a
cogent account of the dayyo rule in terms of pure logic, saying that, in virtue of this
rule, the qal va-chomer argument is ‘an admirable solution (the only one known to me)
of the problem of making an analogy an exact reasoning’. Guggenheimer also gives a
rendering of the qal va-chomer in the terminology of modern mathematical logic. He
does not mention, however, the stammaic discussion which takes the rule of dayyo out
of the realm of logic, or the considerable medieval discussion based on b. Bava
Qamma 25a.
 15
TWO MODERN TALMUDIC THINKERS

Many Jewish philosophers have developed systems that have some relation to Talmudic
thought, but in most instances, these systems are foisted on the Talmud rather than
integrally derived from it. Thus Aristotelian philosophy became the basis for a Jewish
interpretation of Bible/Talmud, as in the work of Maimonides; or Kantian philosophy in
the work of Hermann Cohen. In more recent times, however, interesting attempts have
been made to develop a philosophy more intimately derived from the Jewish texts
themselves, eschewing presuppositions arising from non-Jewish philosophies. This effort
has been stimulated particularly by the rise of movements in philosophy that have
constituted a profound critique of Western thought in its general conceptions of the
relations between word and thing. While there has always been a kinship between
Western and Talmudic thought in philosophical concern for fundamental issues and
rational methods, the critiques of Nietzsche, Kierkegaard, Bergson, Husserl, Heidegger,
Rosenzweig, Levinas, Derrida and others have opened the way for an interpretation of
the Talmud that can respond to its own rhythms and insights.
Two thinkers who have pioneered this approach to the Talmud have been Max
Kadushin and Emmanuel Levinas.

Max Kadushin (1895–1987)

Kadushin was concerned to determine the level and function of abstraction in rabbinic
thought, and to contrast this with the role of abstraction in Western thought. In The
Rabbinic Mind and other books, he argued that the rabbis did indeed create abstract
concepts out of the mainly concrete formulations of Scripture, but the degree of
abstraction was restricted, and thus the concepts with which they worked tended to
overlap. This is in contrast to the activity of the Greek philosophers, who aimed at
developing abstractions at such a high level that no overlapping occurred, and a
hierarchy of concepts emerged each external to the others and each having its allotted
place in a deductively controlled system.
It is not quite clear how much Kadushin claimed for the kind of thinking he attributed
to the rabbis. At times he described it as ‘tribal thinking’, which might seem
denigratory; but at other times, he suggests that the fully abstract thinking of the
Greeks was a falling-away from the more human and communal thinking of the rabbis,
who preserved modes of thought that were both more primitive and more sophisticated
than the alienated, atomised thinking of the Greek philosophers. Certainly readers of
the later Wittgenstein can see links between his thinking and that of the rabbis as
delineated by Kadushin. Wittgenstein (in his later work) was concerned with ordinary
language as the vehicle of authentic thinking, and he saw language as consisting of
‘families’ of concepts rather than individual, isolated thought-units. Kadushin himself,
however, in so far as he acknowledged the influence of modern philosophy, was indebted
partly to the American pragmatist philosopher C.S. Peirce1, and partly to the British
organicist thinker, A.N. Whitehead.
It is to be expected, further, that Kadushin's approach would be welcomed by those
Jewish thinkers who have embraced the tenets of the deconstructionist school, since
they are in open revolt against the atomised thinking of Western, Greek-derived
philosophy, and have advocated a more organic, non-hierarchical pattern of thinking. Yet
Kadushin has been somewhat ignored by these natural allies. Susan Handelman, for
example, says little about Kadushin in her book The Slayers of Moses, in which she
argues specifically for an affinity between post-modernism and rabbinic thought. She
does however make some incidental remarks noting Kadushin as an ally. For example,
she writes (p. 64), ‘Max Kadushin points out that conceptualization in Rabbinic thought
is always tied to and relies upon the verbal symbols of the text: they are the constants.
In scientific thought, though, the verbal symbols are variable and replaceable; it is the
definition that abstracts and classifies the elements, and the verbal symbols may be
redefined, replaced or exchanged. The scientific concept always consists of a definition
and statement, because it is a conclusion, an idea which is the final result of speculation
or observation. In Rabbinic thinking, by contrast, no verbal concept or symbol can be
delimited, defined, or considered as a finalized statement. New conceptual terms are not
introduced, and thought depends on a play of all the concepts in an integrated manner.’
She refers here to Max Kadushin's The Rabbinic Mind, p. 45, which is a notable
statement by Kadushin of his view that the ‘value concept’ is indefinable.
It may be doubted, however, whether Kadushin is quite so relativistic as post-
structuralist theory would like him to be. Though his rabbinic concepts are permeable
by each other and resist definition, they do show some features of hierarchy, some of
them being labelled as ‘sub-concepts’ and others dominating as leading ideas. This
implies some kind of system and objectivity.
How relativistic, in fact, was Kadushin? He often saw himself as an anthropologist,
recording the rabbinic culture, which he saw as a folk-culture not merely as an
intellectual tradition. In this mood, he imbibed the relativism of anthropologists,
especially those of the Malinowski school, who see their task as a response to an
indigenous culture which they are not at liberty to criticise, since every culture has its
individual, uncriticisable truth (this approach, however, is not without its own
anthropological critics, such as Ernest Gellner).
On the other hand, Kadushin, seeing rabbinic ‘organicism’ as related to the
philosophical critique of Whitehead, saw it as having a message for the modern world
and as offering a remedy to the impasse of modern philosophy. In this mood, he
proposed the rabbinic concepts not merely as a description of one functioning society,
but as a model (though of course not a rigidly prescriptive one) for the healthy and
truthful functioning of other societies.
I myself see Kadushin's presentation of rabbinic concepts as a valid approach to the
characterization of rabbinic thought (especially in the field of aggadah), but not as
precluding or replacing other approaches. Its chief limitation is its lack of a strong
textual or hermeneutic dimension. Though Kadushin never loses sight completely of the
derivation of his rabbinic concepts from Scripture, he often gives the impression of a
rabbinic world of thought subsisting on its own formulations. My own approach to
rabbinic thought, on the contrary, is to stress at every turn its intimate dependence on
the exegesis of Scripture.
When the rabbis studied the Torah, they felt themselves to be in direct contact with
the mind of God. They thus saw themselves as objectivists, not relativists. They had the
same sense of exploring raw reality that is felt by scientists when exploring Nature;
perhaps we can understand even more of the rabbinic attitude by comparing them to
eighteenth-century scientists like Newton (or even medieval scientists like Maimonides)
for whom Nature itself was a book written by God.
This does not mean that the rabbis precluded uncertainty in their researches. On the
contrary, their confidence in the God-given truth of Scripture was complemented by a
wholesome sense of their own inadequacy in the quest to understand and explicate it.
Like scientists who, while accepting the total reality of Nature, regard their own
attempts to understand natural processes as mere provisional theories open to
refutation and replacement, the rabbis understood that the Torah as an ongoing
enterprise was ‘not in Heaven’ but on earth, where it was subject to constant open-
ended discussion and only tentative decisions in the non-final form of majority voting.
This indefinitely-postponed grasp of certainty is very different from the
deconstructionist denial of objective reality, and should not be confused with it.
This is not to deny, of course, that the rabbis adopted a thoroughly polysemic method
in aggadic exegesis. But this is poetry. A thousand different and even conflicting poems
may be written on a single theme; but this does not in any way render relativism an
appropriate description of the consciousness of poetic multifariousness.
Thus the attempts that have been made by post-structuralists to claim the rabbis as
kindred relativists are, partly at any rate, misconceived. As David Stern has pointed out,
in contrast to the post-reconstructionist concept of ‘indeterminacy’, ‘the rabbis hoped to
recapture the fullness of divine presence, even if partially and only momentarily’2.
Yet relativism is not a totally inappropriate term to describe the rabbinic enteprise. In
the foregoing pages, I have given many examples of rabbinic relativism, in the sense
that the life-patterns and human typologies given rabbinic approval are multifarious and
even conflicting, that there is a constant awareness that every rule has exceptions, and
that there are endless variations and tolerated disagreements in the exegesis of biblical
concepts, whether aggadic or halakhic. Relativism, as a doctrine in the modern world,
arose from reaction against dogmatism and intolerance of other cultures; it reacts, in
particular, against imperialist arrogance and scorn for non-Western patterns of society.
There is much in the rabbinic culture that resonates sympathetically with such an
attitude, when it stops short of total denial of absolute values.
In this area of limited relativism, Kadushin's work is important. He presents the
rabbinic thought-world as a folk-culture with links to every layer of Jewish society. He
sees the rabbinic viewpoint as the distillation of the life of the Jewish community, rather
than an élite, mandarin type of insight of the kind promulgated by the Greek
philosophers or the Indian Brahmins. For the rabbis, no doctrine was valuable unless it
echoed and influenced the everyday life of the community. This means that Judaism,
despite its undoubted universalist aspirations as expressed in codes such as the Ten
Commandments and the Seven Noachian Laws, was in practice a particularist faith, in
which members (including converts) had to imbibe an instinctive understanding of a way
of life that bordered on the tribal. It is in the presentation of these instinctive norms and
mores that Kadushin excels, even though he has little to say about Judaism as a
universal faith. In the modern world, conscious of the crimes of imperialism in
suppressing native cultures, and of the indispensable role of communitarianism in the
cultivation of moral values — yet anxious not to lose overall moral control in a welter of
relativism — Kadushin's contribution can give useful guidance.

Emmanuel Levinas
As a philosopher of standing in the modern world, Emmanuel Levinas is of particular
interest to this study, since he not only affirmed the existence of philosophy in the
Talmud but declared rabbinic thought to be relevant and therapeutic in the present
dilemma of philosophy in general. Unlike Kaddushin, Levinas was not a Talmudic
scholar, and his comments are confined largely to aggadic passages, since he modestly
disclaimed competence to deal adequately with halakhic detail. Nevertheless, he had a
good amateur knowledge of the Talmud, and he brought to it the keen intellect of a
professional philosopher, by which he discovered nuances in the text that had escaped
others.
Levinas was well aware that the Talmud is not a philosophical text, in the accepted
sense of the word ‘philosophy’. But he thought that the rabbis, in their meditations on
Scripture, often came up with ideas of philosophical interest, and that these ideas might
be put into some kind of system, even though the rabbis themselves apprehended such a
system only unconsciously, or themselves ordered their ideas in a different way. This is
what Levinas called ‘translating the Talmud into Greek’. Its aim is to follow the grain of
the Talmud itself rather than to foist extraneous ideas upon it, and to see what echoes
can be found in the vocabulary of Western thought.
Of course, such a programme is always open to the objection that the enquirer is after
all reading his own ideas into the text. Levinas does not always escape this objection,
but often he achieves an unexpected marriage of text and Levinasian thought that
throws fresh light on the processes of Talmudic discourse.
The philosophy of Levinas is driven mainly by ethical concerns. He sees ethics as
grounded in appreciation of the separate reality of ‘the other’. In his denial of monism,
or ‘totality’ (which he regards as leading to totalitarianism in politics), he opposed both
idealism and positivism. Whereas many nowadays use his term ‘the other’ mainly
negatively (as a term for the victims of xenophobia), Levinas used it positively, to
express the separateness without which there can be no love. Here he followed the
Talmudic axiom (see p. 13) that every person is a separate universe, but attached a
meaning to it that locates God in the love arising from reverence for the separate
identity of the other.
Levinas gave a celebrated series of lectures in Paris in which he gave close readings of
selected Talmudic passages. I choose for discussion here Levinas's talmudic lecture
entitled ‘Judaism and Revolution’3, a theme that chimes with my own emphasis in
previous pages on the revolutionary character of both Scriptural and Talmudic Judaism4.
Levinas begins by commenting on the following Mishnaic passage:
He who hires workers and tells them to begin early and finish late cannot force them to it if beginning early and
finishing late does not conform to the custom of the place.
Where the custom is that they be fed, he is obliged to feed them; where it is that they be served dessert, he
must feed them dessert. Everything goes according to the custom of the place.
One day, Rabbi Jonathan ben Mathia said to his son, Go hire some workers. The son included food among the
conditions. When he came back, his father said, My son, even if you prepared a meal for them equal to the one
King Solomon served, you would not have fulfilled your obligation toward them, for they are the descendants of
Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. As long as they have not begun to work, go and specify: You are only entitled to bread
and pulse.
Rabban Simeon ben Gamaliel said: It was not necessary to say it, for, in all matters, one acts according to the
custom of the place.
(Mishnah Bava Metzia, 7:1).

Levinas is struck by the ‘Trade Union’ character of this passage. After drawing attention
to the ‘sublime materialism’ of the text, he comments, ‘ … Our old text upholds the right
of the person, as in our days Marxism upholds it. I refer to Marxist humanism, the one
that continues to say that ‘man is the supreme good for man’, and ‘in order that man be
the supreme good for man he must be truly man’ and which asks itself: ‘How could man,
the friend of man, in specific circumstances have become the enemy of man?’ and for
whom the anomaly called alienation is explained by the structure of the economy, left to
its own determinism. Our Mishnah also wants to impose a limit on the arbitrariness of
the economy and on the alienation. Let us underline one more detail of the context in
which the Mishnah places itself, which is typical of Jewish humanism: the man whose
rights must be defended is in the first place the other man, it is not initially myself. It is
not the concept ‘man’ which is at the heart of this humanism, it is the other man.’
Levinas places himself — and the Mishnah — in relation to Marxism. He sees Judaism
as linked to Marxist humanism, the idealism of the early Marxists including Marx
himself, not to the rigid dogmatism and oppressiveness of later Marxism.
Levinas now goes on to comment on the second part of the passage, the anecdote
about Rabbi Jonathan ben Mathia and his son.
‘Here are some indications as to the extent of the other man's right: it is practically an infinite right. Even if I had
the treasures of King Solomon at my disposal, I still would not be able to fulfil my obligations. Of course, the
Mishnah does qualify this. In question is the other man, who descends from Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. But do not
become alarmed. We are not in the presence of a racist idea here. I have it from an eminent master: each time
Israel is mentioned in the Talmud one is certainly free to understand by it a particular ethnic group which is
probably fulfilling an incomparable destiny. But to interpret in this manner would be to reduce the general
principle in the idea enunciated in the Talmudic passage, to forget that Israel means a people who has received
the Law, and as a result a human nature that has reached the fullness of its responsibilities and its self-
consciousness. The descendants of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob are human beings who are no longer child-like.
Before a self-conscious humanity, no longer in need of being educated, our duties are limitless. Workers belong to
this perfected humanity, despite the inferiority of their condition, and the coarseness of their profession. But
strange as it may seem, humanity is nevertheless not defined by its proletariat either. As if all alienation were not
overcome by the consciousness that the working class may achieve from its condition as a class and from its
struggle, as if revolutionary consciousness were not sufficient for disalienation; as if the notion of Israel, people of
the Torah, people as old as the world and as old as persecuted mankind, carried within itself a universality higher
than that of a class exploited and struggling, as if the violence of the struggle were already alienation.’

This eloquent passage of commentary carries echoes of the left-wing vocabulary of the
time. Levinas, addressing a largely left-wing audience, is laying claims for Judaism
which put it in the vanguard of revolution. He stresses the historical role of the Jews
(Israel) as the representatives of the oppressed (here he is referring to the origin of the
Israelites as slaves in Egypt, and to their subjection to successive imperialist invaders,
Assyrians, Babylonians, Persians, Greeks and Romans). While acknowledging the
significance of the working class as the vanguard of ‘disalienation’, Levinas asserts the
even greater significance of Israel as the bearers of a mission of ‘revolutionary
consciousness’ to mankind, and as subsuming within their history the role allotted by
Marx to the working class.
This daring statement, it may be alleged, contains some special pleading. Can the
term ‘Israel’ be given such a universalist meaning? Is it not rather the very essence of
particularism? This is certainly the meaning implanted by two thousand years of
Christian propaganda, which constantly purveys the message that Christianity is the
universalist remedy for Jewish particularism. Levinas, however, refuses to be impressed
by this insistent message, and is alert to the universalism implicit in the term ‘Israel’.
He says that he has it ‘from an eminent master’ that the term ‘Israel’ can have a
universalist connotation, as designating a group dedicated to the spiritual need of
mankind as a whole, bound together into a close-knit group by their very dedication, yet
thereby transcending their particular existence. The ‘eminent master’ referred to is no
doubt Levinas's teacher in Talmudic studies, the somewhat mysterious Mr. Chouchani,
with whom he studied from 1947 to 19515.
Similarly, Levinas sees in the infinite worth assigned to the descendants of Abraham,
Isaac and Jacob not a pride in aristocratic descent but an assertion of the worth of
mankind as a whole, since Abraham himself, in Talmudic tradition, is a universalist
figure extending hospitality and guidance to all peoples. Levinas perhaps underplays
here a message of democracy conveyed in the passage under discussion, alongside one
of universalism. The common labourers, who in Homeric culture for example, would be
regarded as infinitely inferior to the aristocratic god-descended heroes such as Achilles
or Hector, are regarded by the Mishnah as the highest aristocracy. Judaism achieves
democracy by grading-up rather than grading-down: all are aristocrats.
Again, Levinas perhaps elides a certain humorous bathos in our Mishnah passage.
After the lofty image of the labourers as of such high worth that (in the absence of
specificity) they deserve a meal fit for the princes attendant on King Solomon, the
prudent rabbi tells his son to avoid such ruinous expense by stipulating a definite menu:
bread and pulse. An idealistic picture of the labourer yields somewhat comically to the
demands of viable economics, without however any loss of idealism. This dialectic is
typical of rabbinic Judaism, but it it also touches on another consideration: that the
rabbis were sensitive not only to the needs of the workers, but also to the legitimate
interests of their employers. This double sensitiveness is seen in the Torah itself, which
enacts that a labourer may eat of the produce on which he is working, but also enacts
that he may not bring a basket and fill it with take-away produce (Deut. 23:24–5). The
employer has his rights too. In the last resort, this means that the employer too is a Jew,
a descendant of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. Judaism assigns high value to the worker,
but it does not support the notion of a class-war. Rabbi Jonathan, after all, is an
employer, yet it is he who gives moving expression to an idealization of the worker. Here
Levinas's treatment of the Mishnah, in propitiation of his audience, may lean too far in
the direction of Marxism, for he seems to identify the employer with the alienating
forces of capitalist economics rather than seeing him as another embodiment of ‘the
other’.
Levinas's comments here, however, are an excellent example of his method. The
Talmudic passage selected is most promising for his enterprise, for the rabbi's sense of
the worth of his fellow-Jews resonates with the basic theme of Levinas's philosophy, the
infinite obligation of every human being to his neighbour. Moreover, the
employer/employee relationship displayed enables Levinas to make the link he always
seeks between the preoccupations of the Talmud and the pressing issues of modern
times — a link which he often finds in unexpected, enlightening ways.
How does Levinas succeed, however, when the material, on the face of it, is less
promising for his programme? The passage which succeeds the Mishnaic passage
quoted typifies the rambling, free-wheeling digressions, anecdotes and folk-lore (as well
as strenuous legal argument) with which the Gemara supplements the relatively taut
formulations of the Mishnah. In commenting on the Babylonian Talmud, Levinas did not
confine himself to the core text, the Mishnah, but launched himself into the whole ‘sea
of the Talmud’, of which the Gemara (ostensibly a commentary on the Mishnah, but
actually far more than that) forms the major part.
 Here is some of the Gemara (b. Bava Metzia 83a–83b) attached to the Mishnaic
passage quoted, an anecdote about a famous and controversial rabbi:
(The text describes how Rabbi Eleazar ben Simeon met a Jew who had been appointed thief-catcher by the
Romans. Rabbi Eleazar asked him how he could do this job, in view of the danger of arresting innocent persons, to
which the reply given was ‘What can I do? The Government has commanded me to do the job.’ Eleazar (the
‘Jewish Sherlock Holmes’) then gave his questioner advice about how to detect genuine thieves and so avoid
arresting innocent persons. This advice became known to the Romans, who then appointed Rabbi Eleazar himself
to be the thief-catcher. He pursued this calling, but aroused the ire of other Jews for handing over his fellow-Jews
to the Romans for punishment.)
Rabbi Joshua ben Korcha sent him this message: Vinegar son of wine, how much longer will you deliver unto
death the people of our God? Rabbi Eleazar conveyed this answer to him: I remove the thorns from the vineyard.
The other replied: Let the owner of the vineyard come and remove the thorns himself.

Levinas comments:
The problem of the defence of man, of the bringing about of an order in which man will be defended, of
revolution, takes us back to the central question. How is it that human order is eaten away by Evil? We begin with
an anecdote: ‘One day Rabbi Eleazar ben Simeon met an officer of the government responsible for catching
thieves/ Rabbi Simeon, father of the Rabbi Eleazar mentioned here, is the famous Rabbi Simeon bar Yochai, who
has a special place among the Tannaim. He and his son spent thirteen years in a cave hiding from the Romans.
Jewish mystical tradition attributes the Zohar to him. These facts are important. We will soon see his son, Rabbi
Eleazar, at the opposite extreme from mysticism, a man very gifted in police work or politics (unless he brings us
something else which we have to look for). In any case, from this anecdote about Rabbi Eleazar it is possible to
conclude that the entire passage we are reading concerns the problem of collaborating with the Romans. The
essence of great texts is not to arise outside history but to have a meaning beyond the situation which has evoked
them. Are we sure that in today's theme — ‘Judaism and Revolution’ — something else besides collaboration with
the Romans is at stake? The text, even if it did arise as a result of cases of collaboration, opens up the entire
problem of the relation between politics and Evil, the problem of the relationship of political struggle and Evil.
That is, the text opens up an essential aspect of the problem of revolution. For a revolution does not destroy the
state: it is for another political regime, but for a political regime nonetheless.

Levinas here is taking a rather surprising line. Other commentators have adopted the
obvious interpretation that our passage is about whether a good Jew can collaborate
with the occupying force of the Roman government. The objection of Rabbi Joshua ben
Korcha is on patriotic grounds; why is Eleazar betraying his fellow-Jews to the Roman
imperialists who have invaded and occupied the land that should rightfully be
administered by Jewish political authority? The situation is like that of France under
Nazi occupation, and Eleazar is a Pétainist.
Levinas, however, sees this as a superficial interpretation. The passage is only
ostensibly about collaboration, but actually addresses the deeper issue of government in
general and its involvement with violence. A revolution aims at the substitution of a just
government for an unjust one, but it can proceed only by violence, and if successful,
must consolidate its rule also by violence. Unlikely as this may seem, the Roman
Occupation stands here as a symbol for revolutionary violence, its apparent opposite.
How does Levinas justify this interpretation? He does so by a subtle argument. He
points out that Eleazar, when asked to explain his behaviour as a collaborationist, does
not make the obvious excuse (used by the preceding thief-catcher and later in the
passage by another collaborationist rabbi, Ishmael ben Yose) that he is acting under
compulsion. Instead, Eleazar excuses himself on general grounds of morality, saying that
he is ridding the community of criminals, removing the thorns from the vineyard.
Instead of self-exculpation, he takes the high moral ground. This must mean that he
regards the Romans as a legitimate authority, or at least as symbolizing the role of any
government in its capacity of peace-keeping by its monopoly of force. (Levinas might
have quoted, in this connection, the rabbinic saying, ‘Pray for the Roman government,
for without it, people would eat each other alive’, M. Avot, 3:2). Eleazar's father Simeon
opposed the Romans at a time of war between the Jews and Romans, but Eleazar, in a
time of settled peace, accepts the pax Romana, and sees the Romans as playing a
necessary role. As such, the Romans, representing government power, exercise the
violence inseparable from all power, including that of revolutionary, or even Jewish,
government.
This throws new light on the reply made to Eleazar by his critic, Joshua ben Korcha,
‘Let the owner of the vineyard come and remove the thorns himself.’ The owner of the
vineyard (the Land of Israel) is not the Romans but God. Joshua is replying in the terms
set by Eleazar. He is not urging a patriotic message, but addressing the fundamental
question, posed by Eleazar, of the use of human violence against evil. When Joshua
compared Eleazar unfavourably with his father Simeon, he was thinking of the latter not
merely as a patriot who opposed the Romans, but as a mystic, to whom the whole
concept of power exercised through violence was unpalatable6.
This interpretation, though daring, is in the end persuasive. It gives added point to the
sequel, in which Eleazar, after all his principled support for political violence, falls
victim to the temptation to use his power unjustly because of personal resentment of an
insult. His attempt to reverse his decision is too late, and Eleazar is wracked by
remorse, hardly alleviated by the revelation that his victim was guilty of other crimes.
This incident illustrates the corrupting influence of power, and gives colour to Levinas's
contention that the whole Gemara passage is a nuanced essay on the theme of power.
The incident comes as a necessary sequel to Eleazar's glorification of power as a means
of combating evil, just as a sympathetic historical account of early Communist idealism
would be incomplete without mention of the sordid sequel of Soviet tyranny and
corruption. Power (which means the exercise of violence) is the indispensable remedy to
evil, yet power corrupts. This, in Levinas's view, is the message of this Talmudic
passage, which he elicits with his usual acumen and deep respect for the philosophical
depth of the text, combined with his alertness for its relevance to the modern world.
What might have seemed a mere folk-tale, or at best a political essay on collaboration
with an occupying enemy, becomes, in Levinas's hands, an exercise in political
philosophy.
1See Ochs, ‘Max Kadushin as Rabbinic Pragmatist’ (1990).
2SeeStern (1985), and Stern (1986) on the relationship between rabbinic exegesis and
modern literary theory.
3Levinas (1990), pp. 94–119.
4Forinteresting discussion and analysis of these lectures see Handelman (1991), pp.
304–335; Aronowicz (1990); Cohen (1999).
5ElieWiesel, who also studied with Chouchani, writes of him in his Legends of our Time,
pp. 87–109. Levinas writes of Chouchani in his introduction to ‘Four Talmudic
Readings’, included in Levinas (tr. Aronowicz), 1990, p. 8.
6Levinas's reference to Simeon ben Yochai as reputedly the author of the Zohar is a little
too accepting, since modern scholarship, led by Gershom Scholem, denies this
attribution. However, certain Talmudic sources point to Rabbi Simeon as having
acquired mystical powers after his long sojourn in the cave (b. Shabbat 33b); his many
contributions to rabbinic debate, however, are all rationalistic in character.
 APPENDIX A

Qal va-chomer in aggadah

According to the rule of dayyo, a qal va-chomer argument is invalid if the conclusion
contains any term not included in the premise.
An apparently glaring infringement of the rule is in Mishnah Makkot, 3:15:
Moreover R. Hananiah ben Gamaliel said: If he that commits one transgression thereby forfeits his life, how much
more, if he performs one religious duty, shall his life be given to him! [Danby translates ‘forfeits his soul’ and ‘his
soul will be restored to him’, but this is unwarranted, since in context karet is being interpreted as death by the
hand of God, not as some spiritual punishment to the soul in the after-life. Moreover, tinaten means ‘will be given’,
not ‘will be restored’.]

This is a very feeble argument, and it also seems inconsequential, since it does not show
any connection with R. Hananiah's immediately preceding remark that those who are
condemned to ‘cutting off’ (karet) can escape this punishment by undergoing flogging
(malqut). Rashi therefore feels constrained to provide an elaborate explanation, based
on the notion that reward for good deeds is much greater (at least 2000 times greater,
he argues on the basis of a proof-text) than punishment for transgression. Rashi thus
seems to imply that the usual rule for a qal va-chomer can be ignored, since there is
such a gap between the two terms ‘transgression’ and ‘performance’. This, however,
might possibly be granted if the conclusion echoed the premise, but it does not. The
premise speaks of forfeiting life, and the conclusion speaks of gaining life. No amount of
weighting can turn a negative premise into a positive conclusion. If another method of
argument were used (instead of the qal va-chomer) some semblance of consecutive
reasoning can be achieved, e.g.: If a man who commits a transgression forfeits his life, it
seems reasonable that the opposite behaviour, the fulfilment of a commandment, will
produce opposite results, namely the gaining of life, especially if we know that reward is
always far greater than punishment. But this reasoning by opposites is not a qal va-
chomer, and Rabbi Hananiah makes it crystal clear (by his use of ‘how much more’) that
he is attempting a qal va-chomer.
Another line of exegesis (see Bertinoro on the Mishnah) tries to provide some
continuity between Rabbi Hananiah's first and second sayings, such continuity being
demanded by the conjunction ve linking the two sayings (in the Gemara Mishnah; the
conjunction may have been omitted in editions of the Mishnah under the inflnence of
exegetes, also quoted by Bertinoro, who denied any continuity between the two sayings
of R. Hananiah). This interpretation sees the one ‘who fulfils the commandment’ as none
other than the one who transgressed a karet law, but later repented and accepted
flogging as his punishment, thereby escaping the heavier punishment of death by the
hand of God. Rabbi Hananiah's second saying thus becomes: If one who transgresses
forfeits his life, how much more so shall one who accepts punishment (thereby
performing a commandment) escape with his life. Here there is certainly some
continuity, but the faultiness in the qal va-chomer argument has not been remedied. The
negative in the premise has turned into a positive in the conclusion, and the argument,
if valid, is an argument by opposites not by qal va-chomer.
I suggest a very simple solution to all these problems. The expression notel nafsho has
been wrongly translated by all commentators as ‘forfeits his life’, but is much better
translated as ‘receives his life’. The verb natal can mean either ‘to remove’ or ‘to
receive’ (see Jastrow, 1926, p. 899). If the meaning here is ‘remove’, then the expression
should be notelin nafsho, ‘they remove his life’, for the singular verb notel would signify
that he takes or removes his own life, and noone is suggesting that we are concerned
here with suicide. I am suggesting, in other words, that the expression notel nafsho
means the exact opposite of what commentators have thought it to mean. With this
correction, the difficulties of continuity and logic disappear.
The translation of R. Hanania's second saying now becomes: ‘If he that commits one
transgression (i.e. the transgressor of a karet law) receives his life (i.e. has his sentence
commuted from death by the hand of God to flogging), how much more so will one who
performs a commandment be given his life!' This is a perfectly valid qal va-chomer
argument, since no term in the conclusion fails to appear in the premise. Also, the
continuity is also excellent, since R. Hanania's second observation is indeed a reflection
based on his first. The unconvincing idea (quoted by Bertinoro), aimed at continuity, that
it is the transgressor who is the performer of a commandment is eliminated. The
transgressor is indeed a transgressor, yet he preserves his life; how much more so
should someone who is not a transgressor but a performer of a commandment preserve
his life!
It may be objected that if the two expressions notel nafsho and yinaten lo nafsho have
identical import, why is the expression varied in this way? The reason may be merely
stylistic. The person who, against the odds, having been condemned to death, is
reprieved, snatches at this unexpected relief and is made the subject of an active verb of
receiving. The person who has deserved reward waits for his due without desperation
and is content to have it bestowed on him. This variation in expression does not affect
the logic of the argument.
On the other hand, it may be objected that the rules of the qal va-chomer, and
especially the rule of dayyo (that the conclusion must not contain any term not
contained in the premise) is not so strictly applied in aggadic as opposed to halakhic
reasonings, and that therefore R. Hananiah's argument should not be subjected to such
severe criticism. There is truth in this, and an example of what appears somewhat loose
aggadic qal va-chomer reasoning is to be found, as it happens, in this very same
mishnah. R. Shimon ben Rabbi reasons: abstaining from blood, which causes revulsion,
brings reward; all the more, abstaining from robbery and incest, which the soul longs
for, should bring reward for all generations to come up to the end of the world. The last
part of this reasoning constitutes a breach of dayyo, for nothing was said in the premise
about all generations to come. Yet in this reasoning, faulty as it is by halakhic standards,
the actual terms are not changed from premise to conclusion. There is only an
intensification of the conclusion, in an enthusiastic, homiletic style. Even in aggadic
reasonings, the rules are never so flagrantly breached as in R. Hananiah's saying, in its
usual interpretation. It is therefore justifiable to look for another interpretation.
 APPENDIX B

Talmudic rectification of abuses

Every legal system is liable to abuses. The Rabbis were well aware of this, and were
prepared to act to counter such abuses, by introducing new bye-laws. The name given to
this process was tiqqun ha- ‘olam (‘rectification of the world’), and the powers which the
rabbis attributed to themselves in this respect were remarkably wide; they even thought
that they were entitled to suspend a law of the Torah on occasion, if this was being used
in an unscrupulous manner to oppress some individual or class of individuals. I give two
examples of the bold rabbinic use of these powers.

The ‘agunah
The Torah rules that a divorce may take place, but it must be given by the husband to
the wife, not vice versa. The rabbis, however, ruled that a wife might obtain a divorce by
applying to the courts. Grounds for such a divorce were many; if her husband decided to
change his city of residence against the wife's will, for example, or if he took up a
profession that made him smelly. If the court granted the divorce to the wife, the
husband would be instructed to give it to her. If, however, he refused to do this, the
court could have him flogged until he complied. This, on the face of it, was contrary to
the law of the Torah which ruled that a divorce could be given only if the husband was
willing; but the rabbis, concerned for the welfare of the wife and not wishing her to be
bound to a marriage which had become obnoxious to her, overruled the literal meaning
of the Torah law, saying that in his heart every Jewish husband wishes to comply with
the authority of a Jewish court. This unconscious desire is taken as sufficient to comply
with the requirement of the husband's consent.
This arrangement worked well enough when Jewish courts had the power to enforce
it. In conditions of Exile, however, a husband could disobey the court with impunity, and
thus there arose a class of ‘chained wife’, i.e. a wife unable to obtain a divorce because
of the incalcitrance of the husband. Sometimes such a husband would demand a large
sum of money as the price of his consent. This problem has been much discussed,
especially in recent years. It constitutes an abuse, for which the rabbinic power of
‘rectification’ can be invoked. Unfortunately, however, modern-day rabbis are much
more reluctant to use such power than their Talmudic predecessors.
The Jewish law of marriage (unlike the law of divorce) is not subject to any rules of the
Torah and is entirely in the hands of the rabbis. It is open to a rabbinic court to annul a
marriage, even if the marriage was perfectly legal in the first place (b. Gittin 33a). The
Talmud records that this power was exercised occasionally by the rabbis in order to
rectify certain abuses. It has been proposed that this power should be exercised today to
rectify the abuse of the ‘agunah . This would mean that the marriage, having been
annulled ab initio, is regarded as never having taken place, and the woman has the
status of an unmarried woman, does not require a divorce, and can marry another man.
This solution has actually been adopted in the Conservative movement in Judaism, but
so far Orthodox authorities have refused to apply it.
It should be pointed out that the children of the annulled marriage would not suffer
legally, or as regards property rights. They would have the status of children of
unmarried parents, but such children are not regarded as ‘bastards’ in Jewish law, since
only children of incestuous or adulterous unions have such status (see next item).

The mamzer
According to Torah law, the child of an incestuous or adulterous union has the status of
mamzer, or ‘bastard’ and suffers the legal disability of not being allowed to marry a non
-mamzer Jew. The status of the mamzer is passed on to all his descendants.
This law aroused much unease among the Rabbis, who saw clearly that it is unjust to
the mamzer who is in no way responsible for his own condition. One rabbi (Rabbi Yose)
expressed this unease by saying that the status of the mamzer would be abolished in the
Messianic age. Modern Reform Judaism has actually abolished this law, which however
remains in force in Orthodox Judaism, though with certain ameliorations (see below).
Since the law is clearly stated in the Torah, Orthodox authorities can see no way to
abolish it, or even to regard it as an abuse for which the rabbinic power of ‘rectification’
can be invoked.
Nevertheless, certain rabbis of the Talmud made determined efforts to make this law
into a dead letter. The famous Babylonian Abba Arika (known as ‘Rav’) proposed the
following legal principle, or legal fiction: ‘No mamzer ever lives longer than 30 days’
(Lev. R. 32:6; see y. Yevamot 49b, where the dictum is quoted in the name of R. Huna).
This principle, if adopted, would have solved the problem, for no mamzer would ever
survive to marriageable age, and even persons suspected of being mamzerim could be
allowed to marry persons of normal birth, since such suspicion would have to be false (it
should be noted that, on Popperian principles, no-one can ever be known to be a
mamzer with 100% certainty). There is evidence that Rav's principle was actually
adopted for a while, with the effect that the law of the mamzer fell into disuse in
Babylonia. However, a rabbi of the next generation, Rabbi Judah, re-interpreted Rav's
dictum to mean, ‘No undetected mamzer ever lives longer than 30 days,’ and this is the
interpretation of the dictum that was eventually accepted, with the result that the law of
the mamzer was re-instituted. A positive result, however, was that the dictum, even as
re-interpreted, ruled out any tendency to search out possible mamzerim. Anyone not
actually known to be a mamzer was assumed not to be one. This has much ameliorated
the law of the mamzer in practice throughout Jewish history. It was even the practice to
advise a mamzer to leave his place of birth and go to live in a place where he was not
known.
There is also a dictum of Rabbi Eliezer (b. Yevamot 78b) that a mamzer never reaches
a third generation; i.e. a mamzer (intermarrying perforce with another mamzer) may
have children and but never grandchildren, for the line dies out. This dictum reduces
greatly the scope of the mamzer law, though not quite so drastically as the dictum of
Rav. On Rabbi Eliezer's principle, anyone purporting to be a third-generation mamzer
must be treated as a normal Jew. Even this dictum, however, was later interpreted to
refer to undetected mamzerim. The nullification of the mamzer, even in this milder form,
was found too radical a concept.
Talmudic law is overdue for a renaissance, since even those ostensibly dedicated to its
study and observance (the Orthodox) often ignore it, because of the medieval and late-
medieval accretions that so often obscure it. If such a renaissance takes place, attention
should be given also to the minority opinions which the Talmud itself overrules, yet
takes such care to preserve. The reason given by the Mishnah for this preservation is
that one day these minority opinions may become the basis for a revision of the law (the
same reason is given for the preservation of dissenting opinions in the records of the
High Court of the United Kingdom). The minority opinions of Rav and Rabbi Eliezer on
the vexed question of the mamzer should be among the first to be given such renewed
consideration.
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 INDEX OF QUOTATIONS

HEBREW BIBLE
Gen. 1:2, 25
Gen. 5:1, 126
Gen. 9:4, 98
Gen. 9:6, 130
Gen. 9:27, 85
Gen. 10:9, 86
Gen. 12:6, 62 n.1
Gen. 13:8, 98 n.15
Gen. 18:12–13, 103
Gen. 18:25, 5, 34
Gen. 19:31–38, 46 n.4
Gen. 20:2, 98 n.15
Gen. 20:12 98 n.15
Exod. 4:17, 23, n.4
Exod. 8:2, 167
Exod. 19:6, 103
Exod. 21–22, 163
Exod. 21:27–8, 193
Exod. 22:1ff, 132 n.5
Exod. 22:10–12, 197
Exod. 22:14, 197
Exod. 23:2, 174
Exod. 24:7, 37
Exod. 32:16, 73, n.6
Lev. 5:1, 13
Lev. 10:9, 89
Lev. 18:9, 98
Lev. 18:18, 99
Lev. 18:24–25, 61
Lev. 19:16, 111, 135
Lev. 19:16, 139
Lev. 19:18, 35
Lev. 19:18, 125, 127
Lev. 19, 80, n. 13
Lev. 25:23, 62
Lev. 25:36, 135
Lev. 25:55, 71
Lev. 26:13, 74
Num. 11:29, 78
Num. 12:14, 197, 200 n.8,
Num. 15:38, 103
Num. 16:3, 78
Num. 16:32, 23, n.4
Num. 21:1, 23, n.4
Num. 21:16, 23, n.4
Num. 22:28, 23, n.4
Num. 25:1–9, 119
Num. 33:50–53, 60
Deut. 4:5–8, 160
Deut. 4:6, 85
Deut. 4:8, 33
Deut. 5:15, 73
Deut. 6:5, 35
Deut. 6:7, 152
Deut. 7:1–5, 60
Deut. 7:70, 61
Deut. 8:5, 80
Deut. 11:2–8, 159
Deut. 14:21, 98
Deut. 16:20, 34
Deut. 17:9–10, 151
Deut. 17:14–15, 145
Deut. 17:14–20, 145
Deut. 17:20, 103
Deut. 20:10, 64
Deut. 23:15–16, 66, n.6
Deut. 23:24–5, 212
Deut. 24:8, 151
Deut. 25:5–10, 169 n.4
Deut. 26:5, 19 n.1
Deut. 29:14–15, 160
Deut. 30:12, 174
Deut. 33:2, 36
Deut. 33:10, 152
Josh. 2, 63
Josh. 9, 62
Josh. 11:10–20, 50
Josh. 15:63, 64
Josh. 24:12, 61, 64
Josh. 24:13, 61
Judges 5:27, 114
Judges 8:23, 150
I Sam. 5:7, 64
I Sam. 8, 102
I Sam. 8:5, 145
I Sam. 8:6, 145
I Sam. 8:18, 145
I Sam. 15:6, 63 n.3
II Sam. 11:11, 146
I Kings 2:39, 66
Isaiah 2:11, 25
Isaiah 14:14, 8
Isaiah 19:24, 72 n.3
Jeremiah 48:47, 72 n.3
Jeremiah 49:6, 39, 72 n.3
Jeremiah 49:39, 72 n.3
Ezekiel 1, 8
Ezekiel 29:14, 72 n.3
Zechariah 8:19, 99
Zechariah 14:21, 65 n.5
Malachi 1:11, 80
Psalms 104:15, 89
Proverbs 11:10, 13
Proverbs 8:22–27, 28
Ecclesiastes 7:16, 111
Esther 8:17, 128 n.2
II Chron. 26:16–21, 143

INTERTESTAMENTAL LITERATURE
Jubilees 7:28–31, 98

NEW TESTAMENT
Matthew 5:18, 182 n.9
Matthew 5:28, 110
Matthew 19:19, 35
Matthew 22:35–40, 126 n.1
Matthew 26:53, 149
Mark 2:27, 87
Mark 12:28–34, 126
Luke 8:41, 158 n.12
Luke 10, 128
Luke 16:17, 182 n.9
John 11:50, 116
Acts 1:6, 148
Acts 5, 70
Acts:18:8, 158 n.12
Acts 21:18–26, 91 n.7
Galatians 4:24, 73 n.6

MISHNAH
M.Avot 2:12, 154
M.Avot, 3:2, 86, 215
M.Avot 3:15, 11
M.Avot 4:13, 143
M.Avot 4:18, 107
M. Avot 5:6, 23 n.4
M. Bava Batra 8:5, 108
M. Bava Qamma 2:5, 165
M. Bava Metzia, 7:1, 209
M. Demai 6:3, 176
M. Eduyot, p. 177 n.5
M. Hagigah 2:7, 96 n.11
M. Hagigah 2:1, 5
M. Horayot 3:7, 137 n.8
M. Horayot 3:8, 137 n.8
M.Makkot, 3:15, 217
M. Negaim 9:3, 176 n.4
M.Ohalot 7:6, 132
M.Peah 5:2, 176
M.Peah 7:7, 176
M. Pesahim 10:4, 19
M. Sanhedrin 2:2, 146
M. Sanhedrin 3:3, 131
M. Sanhedrin 4:5, 13
M. Sanhedrin 6:7, 133
M. Sanhedrin 8:7, 138
M. Shabbat 14:4, 102
M. Ta'anit 3:8, 94
M. Terumot 8:4, 95
M.Terumot, 8:12, 115

OTHER TANNAITIC SOURCES

Avot de-Rabbi Nathan A41, B48, 143
Mekhilta, Neziqin 9, 193
Mekhilta, Pischa, Bo 1, 79
Mekhilta, Shabbeta 1, 87
Mekhilta, Yitro, 5, 37
Sifra 89b, 126
Sifra, on Lev. 20:26, 90
Sifrei Deut, Berakhah, 343, 37
Sifrei on Deut. 20:10, 64
Sifrei on Deut. 34:10, 80
Tosefta BM 3, 108
Tosefta, Sanhedrin 13:2, 88
Tosefta Sheviit 8, 108
Tosefta, Sotah 15:11–13, 90

BABYLONIAN TALMUD
b. Bava Batra 60b, 90
b. Bava Metzia 10a, 71
b. Bava Metzia 59b, 107, 174
b. Bava Metzia 62a, 135
b. Bava Metzia 83a–83b, 213
b. Bava Metzia 84a, 195
b. Bava Metzia 95a, 197
b. Bava Qamma 25a, 200–201 n.8
b. Berakhot 5a, 184
b. Berakhot 8b, 85
b. Berakhot 10a, 94 n.8
b. Berakhot 17a, 107
b. Berakhot 62a, 104
b. Berakhot 64a, 76
b. Eruvin 13b, 3, 177
b. Eruvin 54a, 73 n.6
b.Gittin 6b, 177
b. Gittin 33a, 222
b. Hagigah 12a, 15 n.5, 26
b. Hagigah 13a, 7, 8
b. Hagigah 16a, 107
b. Horayot 10b, 113, 120
b. Hullin 13b, 87 n.4
b. Hullin 109b, 90
b. Keritot 11a, 182
b. Ketubot 17a, 103
b. Megillah 9a–b, 85 n.2
b. Megillah 19b, 184
b. Nazir 23b, 113, 113 n.3, 120
b. Nedarim 20b, 179
b. Nedarim 81a, 154
b. Niddah 55b, 113 n.3
b. Pesachim 50b, 36
b. Qiddushin 30a, 107
b. Qiddushin 30b, 25
b. Qiddushin 31a, 79
b. Qiddushin 39b, 95
b. Qiddushin 66a, 71, 144
b. Rosh Hashanah 18b, 99
b. Rosh Hashanah 25b, 188
b. Sanhedrin 14a, 71 n.2
b. Sanhedrin 51b, 182
b. Sanhedrin 58b, 98 n. 15
b. Sanhedrin 67b, 168
b. Sanhedrin 72a, 132 n. 5
b. Sanhedrin 72b, 132, 133
b. Sanhedrin 74a, 82 n.14, 114, 129 n.3, 136
b. Sanhedrin 75a, 121
b. Sanhedrin 92a, 8
b. Sanhedrin 97a, 25
b. Sanhedrin 99a, 150
b. Sanhedrin 105a, 88
b. Shabbat 14a, 106
b. Shabbat 33b, 216 n.6,
b. Shabbat 56a, 146
b. Shabbat 75a, 85
b. Shabbat 88a, 37
b. Shabbat 88b, 23
b. Shabbat 104a, 182 n.9
b. Sotah 13b, 111
b. Sotah 21b, 111
b. Sotah 49b, 106
b. Sukkot 28a, 176 n.4
b. Ta'anit 11a, 90
b. Ta'anit 22a, 131
b. Ta'anit 23a, 93
b. Ta'anit 23b, 94
b. Yevamot 16a, 170
b. Yevamot 65b, 103
b. Yevamot 78b, 223
b. Yevamot 103a, 113 n.3
b. Yoma 69b, 87
b. Yoma 84b, 82

PALESTINIAN TALMUD
y. Peah 1:15c, 79
y. Peah, 2:4, 184
y. Qiddushin, end, 90
y. Shev. 7, 36c, 63 n.2
y. Sotah, 8:3, 144
y. Ta an. 23a, 95
y. Yevamot 49b, 223

MIDRASH
Deut. R. 5:14, 64
Esther R. 4:12, 85
Exod. R. Ve'era 10, 168
Gen. R. 1:1, 23
Gen. R. 3:7, 6
Gen. R. 8:1, 15 n.5
Gen. R. 8:1, 25
Gen. R. 22, 46 n.4
Gen. R. 24:7, 126
Gen. R. 48:18, 103
Gen. R. 51, 46 n.4
Gen. R. 68, 24
Gen. R. 91.3, 91 n.7
Gen. R. 94:9, 117
Lev. R. 9, 99
Lev. R. 17:6, 63, 63 n.2

POST-RABBINIC SOURCES
Bertinoro on M.Makkot 3:15, 218
Maimonides
Guide, I:32, 7
Mishneh Torah, Melakhim, 8:11, 88.
Mishneh Torah, Rotzeah, 4:9, 130
Nachmanides, Commentary on Torah, Exod. 13:6, 23
Rashi on Exod. 8:2, 168
Rashi on Gen.20:12, 98 n.15
Tosafot on b. Yev. 103a, 115 n.5

GREEK SOURCES
Aristotle, Politics, 1255a, 72
Eusebius, Hist. 3:12, 157 n.11
Eusebius, Hist. 3:19:1 to 3:20:7, 157 n.11
Josephus
Ant., xii:289, 11
Ant., xiv:41, 155 n.10
Ant., xvii:2, 42–44, 70
Ant., xviii:13, 11
Ant., xix:294, 91 n.7
Ant., xx:10, 69, 249 n.1
Jewish War, ii:17, 442–3, 150
Letter of Aristeas, 85, n.2
 GENERAL INDEX

Aaron, 78
Abba Arika, 71, 90, 223 (see also Rav)
Abba Hilkiah, 91, 95, 103
Abel, 46 n.4, 97, 114, 123
Abimelech, p. 98 n.15
abortion, 132
Abraham, 5, 20, 58, 62 n.1, 98, 103, 115 n.6, 209
reproves God, 34
Abravanel, Isaac, 146 n.7
Achilles, 212
Achnai's oven, 184
Acts, 70
Adam, 14, 15, 128
Adamic period, 97
Adam Kadmon, 15 n.5
adultery, 109, 114
Aesculapius, 72
a fortiori argument, 165, 196 (see also qal va-chomer)
‘aggadah, 13, 39, 192, Chapter 2, passim, Appendix A, passim
‘agunah, 186 n.12, 221
Ahab, 70
Ahasuerus, 115
Akiva, 7, 11, 12, 17, 104, 125, 126, 135, 181–183
Alexander, 147, 155 n.10
Alexander Jannaeus, 71, 144 n.5
Ammon, 72 n.3
‘amoraim, 17, 187
Amorite, 60
Aqedah, 5
American Declaration of Independence, 38
Annas, 70
antisemitism
Christian responsibility for, 70
Apocrypha, 115 n.6
Aquilas, 85 n.2
Araunah the Jebusite, 65 n.5
Archimedes, 185
archisynagogos, 158 n.12
Aristobulus I, 144 n.6
Aristotle, 10, 22, 27, 72 n.5, 73, 183, 203
Aronowicz, Annette, 209 n.4
Aryan race, 20
asceticism, 90
Ash'arites, 22
asmakhta, 105
Assyrians, 211
astronomy, 6
Augustus, 147
‘averah lishmah, 119
‘Avot (Ethics of the Fathers), 54 n.6, 107
Axial Age, 87

Baal ShemTov, 109 n.4

Babylon, 142
Babylonians, 211
Babylonian Talmud, 184–5
Balaam, 80
Bar Kokhba, 167
Bauer, Bruno 32
Beit Shemuel, 122
belimah, 25 n.5
Ben Azzai, 7, 104, 125, 127
Ben Petura, 134–135
Ben Sira, 7, 155 n.10
Ben Zoma, 7
Bergson, Henri, 2, 203
Berkeley, Bishop, 2, 22
Bertinoro, Obadiah, 11, 218
Beruriah, 94 n.8,
Bezalel, 76
biblical epistemology, 160ff
binyan ‘av, 192, 195, 200
blood
permitted food for Gentiles, 98
Borg, Marcus, 97 n.13, 131 n.4
Boule de Suif, 119
Boyarin, D., 173 n.2
Brahmins, 207
Buddhism, 87
burial society, 97
Caiaphas, 116
Cain, 46 n.4, 97, 114, 123, 125, 129
calendar, 85
Canaanites, 60, 62 n.1, 66
Canaanite cities
survival of, 64
canon of Bible, 79
canonization
of Mishnah, 186
Carpocratians, 114
causation, 22
charismatics 95
chasid, 109
chasidim, 93, 95, 108
different definitions of, 109 n.4
chasid shoteh, 111
chaverim, 95, 166
chavurah, 95, 96
chesed, 107
chilazon 103
Chosen People, 19–20, 80
as pilot project, 73
Chouchani, 211, 211 n.5
Christianity
Christian polemics, 175
chullin, 95
chuqim, 161
Claudius, 72 n.4
Cohen, Hermann, 203
Cohen, Richard A., 209 n.4
Cohen, Stuart A., 142 n.2, 146
Communist Manifesto, 38
Confucianism, 87
covenant, 5, 36, 38
co-wife, 169 n.4
‘creation from nothing’, 24
‘crowns’ of the Torah, 182
Cynic and Epicurean chria, 4 n.2, 77

Dama ben Netinah, 79, 86

damages
horn, tooth, foot, 163
Danzger, M.H., 107 n.3
David, King, 70, 146, 147
dayyo, 196, 199, 201 n.8, 203, Appendix A passim
Dead Sea Scrolls, 187
Talmud, contrast with, 112
death-penalty, 138
Deborah, 114, 119
dechiyah, 118
Delilah, 119
de'oraita, 105, 184
derabbanan, 184
derekh ‘eretz, 85, 93, 101, 104
Derekh ‘Eretz Kabbah, 107
Derekh ‘Eretz Zutta, 107
Derrida, Jacques, 2, 84, 203
Descartes, 1, 159
Dosa ben Hyrcanus, 168, 172, 180 n.7
Douglas, Mary, 76, 76 n.10, 80 n.13
dualism, 26

each person a world, 13, 13 n.3

Ecclesiastes, 4
Ecclesiasticus, 155 n.10
Edomites, 38, 40
Egyptian priesthood, 90
Egypt, 2 n.3
Eighteen Blessings, 150
‘ein ruach chakhamim nocheh heimenu 108
Einstein, 6
Elam, 72 n.3
Eldad, 78
Eleazar b. Azariah, 90, 167, 168
Eleazar ben Arak, 168
Eleazar ben Simeon, 213
Eleazar ha-Kappar, 89
election of Israel, 18
Eliezer, Rabbi, 110, 129 n.3, 173–178, 180 n.8, 184, 110, 223
Elijah, 70, 174, 117–118
Elijah of Vilna, (Vilna Gaon), 122
Elisha ben Avuya, 7
Enoch, Book of, 28
Esther, 115, 121–122
Esther, Book of, 128 n.2
Exilarchate, 109
Exodus, 71
Exodus from Egypt, 18
Ezekiel, Book of, 6
Ezra, 86

Fichte, 32
Fischel, H.A, 4 n.2
Fisch, Menachem, 166 n.2, 173 n.2, 174, 176, 177 n.5, 178, 180, 183, 187
forbidden topics, 6
Frankjacob, 113–114
free will, 11
Freud, 41

Gamaliel I, 70
Gamaliel II, 106, 180
Gaston, Lloyd, 52 n.5
Gellner, Ernest, 46 n.3, 83 n.1, 123 n.8, 205
gemara, 139
Genesis, 6, 21, 25
Gentile converts to Pauline Christianity, 69
Gentiles,
moral example to Jews, 79
Gibeonites, 62, 63, 63 n.2,
Gideon, 149
Ginzberg, Louis, 63 n.2
Girgashites, 63
Golden Calf, 183
Golden Rule, 10
Gordis, Robert, 14, 14 n.4
Grace after meals, 3
Greek atomists, 1
Greek culture, 84
Guggenheimer, H., 196 n.3, 201 n.8

haflagah, 86 n.3
haggadah, 18, 19
Haggai, 169, 180 n.7
Halakhic Midrashim, 17
Haman, 90
hamaqom, 24
Hammurabi, 147
Hanan, 94
Hananiah ben Gamaliel, 217
Handelman, Susan, 2, 196, 198 n.6, 200 n.7, 204, 209 n.4
Hanina ben Dosa, 110, 175
Hasmoneans, 144, 144 n.6, 148 n.8
Hebrew prophets, 71
Hector, 212
Hegel, 32
Hegesippus, 157 n.11
Heidegger, 203
Heikhalot literature, 6
Hellenistic philosophers, 10
Heraclitus, 3
Herod, 69 n.1, 70
heteronomy, 31, 41
Hezekiah, 150
High Court of UK, 224
High Priest, 69 n.1, 148 n.8, 154, 155 n.10
hilkheta ke-batraia, 188
Hillel, 10, 74 n.7
Hillel, House of, 3, 103
on co-wife, 169
Hillel, Rabbi, 150
Hinduism, 81, 87
Hirsch, Samson Raphael, 105
Hisda, Rav, 133
histakel, 8
Hittites, 60
Hivites, 59, 60
Hiyya bar Ada, 144
Hobbes, 14
Holiness Code, 81
Holocaust, 116
Homer, 3, 14
homicide
murder distinguished from, 132
Homiletic Midrashim, 17
Honi the Circlemaker, 91, 94, 175
House of Shammai, 3
Hume, 7, 22, 33
Huna, Rav, 133
Husserl, 2, 203

Ibn Ezra, 62 n.1

incest, 97, 114
induction, 163, 192 n.1, 195
inspiration, 179
interest on loans, 73
Isaac, 5, 58, 98, 209
Isaiah, 110
Ishmael ben Yose, 215
Ishmaelites, 38, 40
Ishmael, Rabbi 129 n.3, 182
Islamic philosophy, 22
Israelite religion, revolutionary 58
Israelites
Land of Israel and, 66

Jacob, 58, 98, 209

Jacobson, Dan, 20, 78, 78 n.12
Jael, 114–115, 121–122
James, 91 n.7, 98 n.14
Jebusite, 60
Jephtha, 188
Jeremiah, 72 n.3
Jeremiah, Rabbi, 174
Jerusalem Church, 70, 148
Jerusalem Council, 98 n.14
Jerusalem, 157 n.11
Jesus, 10, 28, 116, 126
betrayal of, 113
death, responsibility for, 69
supererogatory virtue and, 110
Jethro, 89
Jews, mixed racial descent of, 20
Job, 4, 79
Johanan bar Nappacha, 179
Johanan ben Dahabai, 167, 179
Johanan ben Gudgada, 96 n.11
Johanan ben Zakkai, 7–9, 107
John Hyrcanus, 144 n.6
Jonah, 28, 79
Jonathan ben Hyrcanus, 168
Jonathan ben Mathia, 209
Josephus, 11
account of Pharisees, 70
Joshua, 63, 78
Joshua bar Korchah, 167, 213
Joshua ben Hanania, 90, 104, 174, 178 n.6, 189
Joshua ben Levi, Rabbi, 117, 184–185
Josiah, 64
Jubilee, 72, 74
Judah, 120
Judah, Rabbi, 104, 131, 223
Judah the Prince, 157, 180
Judaism
blueprint for morality, 77
as universal religion, 128
revolutionary character of, 21
Judan of Ein-Todros, 144
Judas Iscariot, 113
Jude, 157 n.11
Judges, age of, 146
Judgment and mercy, 11
Judith, 115, 115 n.6, 121
Julius Caesar, 147
Justice, 34, 36

Kabbalah, 8, 28, 114

Kadushin, Max, 2, 20 n.2, 203–207
Kahana, Rav, 104
Kant, 12, 31, 34, 41, 88, 127, 203
karet, 217, 218
Kattina, Rav, 25
kelal, 127
Kenites, 63, 63 n.3.
keraia, 182 n.9
keter kehunah, 153
keter torah, 153
Kierkegaard, 3, 203
king
secular status of, 147
kingdom of God, 148
kingdom of priests, 96, 103
kingship
biblical view of, 144
Koestler, Arthur, 20, 45 n.2
Korah, 78

Lamberton, Robert, 3 n.1

Land as moral project, 35
lavatory
etiquette in, 104
Leibnitz, 14
Lenin, 78
leprosy, 197
Levinas, Emmanuel, 208–216,
Levi, Primo, 136 n.6
levirate marriage, 169 n.4
Levites, 152–153
lifnim mishurat hadin, 110
liquids, law of, 95
lishmah, 113
logic, 1
of Talmud, Ch.14 passim
Logos, 28
Lot, 89, 98 n.15
daughters of, 46 n.4, 114, 123 n.9
Love, doctrine of, 35
Lurianic Kabbalah, 24
Lycurgus, 57
Lydda, 118

Maccoby, Ephraim Meyer, 111 n.5

Maccoby, Hyam, 27 n.6, 45 n.2, 52 n.5, 74 n.7, 77 n.11, 98 n.14, 113 n.2, 143 n.4, 163
n.l, 173 n.1, 173 n.2, 197 n.4
Mach, 2
magic
abolition of, in Judaism, 76
Maimonides, 7, 8, 11, 12, 22, 105, 130, 203, 206, 130
on Noachic laws, 88
majority decision, 175, 177
Malachi, 175
Malinowski, 205
malqut, 217
mamzer, 222–224
martyrdom, 122
three laws of, 129
Marx, Karl, 32, 75, 76
Marxism, 209
Masson, I., 44 n.1
Mastema, 8
Matthew, Gospel of, 126 n.1
‘Measure for Measure’, 115
Medad, 78
medieval philosophy, 22
Megillat Ta'anit, 17
Menahem (Manahem), 150
Menasseh, King, 64
menatzechim, 178
Messiah, 148, 148 n.8
Messianic Age, 78
sacrifices abolished in, 99
middat chasidim, 109
milchemet chovah, 147
milchemet reshut, 147
Mill, John Stuart, 163
Ministering Angels, 179
minority opinions, 112, 224
miracles, 95
Miriam, 197, 200 n.8
Mishnah, 6, 15, 17, 54 n.6,
Order of Purities in, 80
mishpatim, 161
mityahadim, 128 n.2
mitzvah, 113
mitzvah haba'ah be'averah, 120
Moab, 72 n.3, 119
monadology, 14
Montesquieu, 142
Mordecai, 115
Moses, 181, 78, 40, 68
as revolutionary leader, 57
murex, 103
mysticism, and ritual purity, 96

Nachman bar Isaac, 120

Nachmanides, 22, 22 n.3, 24
Nahor, 19, 98 n.15
Nasi (title), 156
Nathan (prophet), 70
Nathan, Rabbi, 174
Nazirites, 74, 77, 89–90,
Neoplatonists, 8, 14
nethinim, 65 n.5
Neusner, Jacob, 2, 163, 179
Newton, Isaac, 206
Nietzsche, 3, 9, 41, 143 n.3, 159
Nimrod, 8, 86
Nineveh, 79
Ninth of Av, 99
Noachic Laws, 88, 97, 98, 98 n.14, 129
Noah, 88, 129
Novak, David, 136 n.7
Numa, 57

Ochs, Peter, 204 n.1

‘olam male, 13 n.3
Oral Torah, 184
Orientalism, 83
Orphics, 90

Palestinian Talmud, 184

panentheism, 24
Paran, Mount, 36
pardes, 168
Passover Haggadah, 160
Passover Seder service, 18
Patriarchy (office), 157
Paul, 35, 73 n.6, 75, 91 n.7, 129
use of a fortiori by, 197 n.5
Peirce, C.S., 204
Perizzite, 60
Persians, 211
culture of, 85
peshat, 168
Pyeatainists, 215
Peter, 70
Pharaoh, 147
Pharisees, 11, 69, 70, 144, 144 n.5
in New Testament, 71
phenomenalism, 2
phenomenology, 18
Philistines, 119
Philo, 27, 28
philosophy of Nature, 21
philosophy v. theology, 18
Pilate, 69
Pilgrim Festivals, 81
Plague of Frogs, 167
Plato, 3, 9, 10
Plotinus, 9
Poliakov, Leon, 44 n.1
polygamy, 109
Pompey, 155 n.10
Popper, Karl, 9, 177, 192, 192 n.1
pre-Socratics, 6, 9, 14
priesthood, 152, 154
prosbol, 74 n.7
Protagoras, 3
Pseudepigrapha, 8
Purim, 90
pursuer (rodef), 133, 138–139
Pythagoras, 185
Pythagoreans, 90

qal va-chomer, 165, 196, 199, 200–201 n.8, App.A passim

Qiddush, 89
Qohelet, 4

rabbinic liturgy, 17
rabbinic optimism, 4
Rahab, 63
Rashi, 62 n.l, 98 n.15, 217
Rav(Abba Arika), 104, 181, 183 n.11
Rava, 136
Rechabites, 89
Red Cow ritual, 161
relativism, 84ff
and timebound ethics, 97
repentance, 108
resh galuta, 157
Rishonim, 186 n.12
ritual purity in Judaism, 95–98
Rome, 211
Rosenzweig, Franz, 203
Rose, Paul Lawrence, 32, 32 n.2
Rousseau, Jean Jacques, 41, 43–46, 57
Ruth, 114

Sabbateanism, 114
Sabbath, 75, 76 n.9
healing on, 87, 102
Sadducees, 154 n.9
Said, Edward, 83
Salome Alexandra, 156
Samaritans, 128
Samson, 89, 119
Samuel, 89, 102, 188
Sanders, E.P., 158 n.12
Sanhedrin, 70, 116
Sarah, 98 n.15, 103, 115 n.6
Satan, 79
Schapira, Isaac, 46 n.4
Scholem, Gershom, 114, 114 n.4, 216 n.6
Schopenhauer, 3
science, scope of 6
scientific method
rabbinic methodology compared with, 162
Seder ‘Olam Rabbah, 17
Seder, p.73 n.6
Sefer ha-Temunah, 114
Sefer Tagin, 182 n.9
Seleucids, 155
self-defence, 137
semukhin, 76 n.9
Seth, 97
settlement of the world, 130
sevara, 136
Shaddai, 89
Shakh, 122
shamir, 23 n.4
Shammai, House of, 103, 169
shelo lishmah, 36
Shem, 62 n.1
shema', 127, 187
shemittah, 74
shibbuta, 90, 90 n.6
Shiur Qpmah, 8, 9, 17
Simeon ben Yochai, 102, 214, 216 n.6
Simeon ben Gamaliel, Rabban, 209
Simeon ben Shetach, 71 n.2, 94–5
Simeon Stylites, 91
Sinai, Covenant of, 98, 129
Sinai, Mount, 37, 67, 129, 174, 184
Sisera, 114
Slaves
in Israelite culture, 71–2,
in non-Israelite cultures, 72
Socrates, 9, 10, 183
Sodom and Gomorrah, 5, 123 n.9
Solomon, 209
as biblical author, 147
Solon, 57
Spartacus, 57
Spielberg, Steven, 13 n.3
spirit of God, 25–26
Spiro, Solomon J., 96 n.12
Steiner, George, 114
Stern, David, 206, 207 n.2
Stoic and Cynic philosophers, 10
Synoptic Gospels,
Trial of Jesus in, 70

Ta'anit, 17
Tabernacle, 76, 76 n.9
tagin, 182 n.9
Tamar, 114, 120
Tanakh, 191
Tanna'im, 187
Taoism, 87
Tarfon, Rabbi, 165, 198–201
Targumim, 17
tekhelet, 103
Temple, 77
Terah, 19, 58, 98 n.15
terumah, 95, 96
teshuvot, 177 n.5
Thales, 9
Theodotus, 158 n.12
Theophrastus, 10
Thor, 170
Three Crowns, doctrine of, 143
time, as real, 27
tiqqun ha-'olam, 221
tohu vavohu, 26
Torah, crown of, 153
as word of God, 159
as a revolutionary document, 38
Torah ‘im derekh’ eretz, 105
Torah interpretation and scientific method, 162
Torah, personified as Wisdom, 28
Tosefta, 17
Tower of Babel, 86 n.3
transgressional sacralism, Chapter 9 passim

Ulla ben Kishar, 117

Untouchables, 118
Uriah the Hittite, 146
utilitarianism, 14
Utopian institutions in Judaism, 74

vatiq, 185
Vermes, Geza, 116 n.7
Vespasian, 157 n.11
Visuvalingam, Sunthar, 113 n.1
Voltaire, 69

Walzer, Michael, 39, 39 n.3, 58

Ward, Lord Justice, 132
Weber, Max, 142
Weiler, Gershon, 141, 141 n.1
Weltanschauung and philosophy, 18
Whitehead, A.N., 204, 205
Wiesel, Eli, 21 n.5
Wisdom, as Torah, 28
Wisdom literature, 7
Wittgenstein, L., 204
women, Rabbinic attitude towards, 119

Yannai, King, 71 n.2

Yehuda, Rav, 181
yichud, 122
yishuvo shel ‘olam, 130
Yose, Rabbi, 223

Zadok, 65 n.5
Zealots, 118
Zechariah, 65 n.5, 110
Zekhut ‘avot, 20
zenut, 121
Zimri, 120
Zohar, 179, 214, 216 n.6
Zoroastrianism, 87