MODERN RABBINIC
THOUGHT
By Rav
Yitzchak
Blau
Shiur #09:
R. Hirsch and
the Details of Mitzvot
In last weeks
shiur, we noted that R.
Hirsch rejects practical or hygienic explanations for
mitzvot, as well as historically contextual explanations. He is also critical of explanations that
ignore the details of mitzvot or the Oral Laws elucidation of the
mitzvot. In this
shiur, we will move from the general overview to concrete examples of his
method.
Taamei ha-mitzvot
(rationales for
commandments) play a major role in R. Hirschs commentary on the Torah, in his
Horeb, and in a long essay he wrote on Jewish Symbolism that appears in
the third volume of his Collected Writings (Feldheim: New York,
1984). In that essay, he explains
the commandments of brit mila, tzitzit, tefillin and the
mishkan. The
difference between R.
Hirschs and Rambams approach emerges quite
sharply.
Rambam explains that
tefillin and tzitzit belong to a category of commandments that
remind us to acknowledge God and to love and revere Him (Guide of the
Perplexed 3:44). He views
circumcision as a commandment intended to weaken sexual desire and to provide a
bodily marker of Jewish identity (Guide of the Perplexed 3:49). Questions such as why circumcision
must take place during the daytime or why we put on the tefillin shel yad
(the tefillin worn on the arm) before the tefillin shel rosh (the
tefillin worn on the head) do not interest him in the slightest. Indeed, as we saw in the last
shiur, Rambam writes that we should not search for reasons for the
details of mitzvot (Guide of the Perplexed
3:26).
In contrast,
R. Hirsch
insists that an adequate explanation must work out the details as well. According to his understanding, the
tefillin shel yad represent dedicating our actions to God, while
the tefillin shel rosh represent dedicating our thoughts to
God. We lay phylacteries on the
hand first to demonstrate that in Judaism, religious actions are more
significant than theoretical speculation.
We have already encountered the primacy of practice as an important theme
for R. Hirsch.
In the same vein,
seemingly technical details teach important messages. The four passages in the Torah that
mention tefillin comprise the text that is found inside the boxes of the
tefillin. All four passages
are in one compartment in the shel yad but in four separate compartments
in the shel rosh.
R.
Hirsch writes that this indicates that our thoughts incorporate
a variety of distinct and important themes but those disparate themes must be
united in one purposeful life of Jewish practice. We place the parchment in batim
(literally = houses, the term in halakhic literature for the boxes of the
tefillin) because a house symbolizes stability and
permanence. Those
batim must be square because while nature can produce round items, only
the human being called upon by tefillin is capable of producing square
objects.
The Torah explicitly
says that tzitzit remind us to adhere to the commandments. R. Hirsch points out that humanity adopted garments
as a result of the first sin. Thus,
garments appropriately remind us to keep Gods word. The fringes of the tzitzit unite
the white of universalism with the blue of Jewish particularism. Each fringe has a knotted section and a
part that hangs loose to symbolize that the Torah restrains humanity but also
allows for human freedom to flourish.
Circumcision teaches
a similar balance. The act of
cutting indicates a restraining of physicality and desire. However, the peria that peels
back the membrane symbolizes the ability to release physicality in a positively
channeled fashion. Here,
R. Hirsch
returns to another of his favorite themes, that Judaism demands the
sanctification of the physical and not its nullification.
Daytime represents
the time of human activity, creativity, and optimism. Nighttime symbolizes human passivity,
dependence and helplessness. For
R. Hirsch,
Judaism emphasizes the former much more than the latter. Therefore, baby boys must enter the
covenant in the daytime. For the
same reason, the entire Temple sacrificial order must take place during
the day. Would we circumcise or
offer sacrifices at night, some might understand Judaism to be a religion of
cowering man offering homage to the dark powers of the universe. This explanation coheres with the
theme of human optimism we noted in an earlier
shiur.
R.
Hirsch rejects the
possibility that the Torah rules out nighttime circumcision as a practical
method of ensuring good lighting for this delicate operation. He also argues against the idea that we
wait for the eighth day to ensure the health of the baby. As mentioned, R. Hirsch rejected practical
explanations for mitzvot.
The topic of
circumcision also shows his use of details to prove the correctness of a given
approach. There is a case in
Shabbat (135b) where a non-Jewish maidservant is purchased along with her
newborn baby son. That baby is
circumcised on the day of purchase even if he was born that very day. If the choice of day reflects health
concerns, we would never have a case in which circumcision happens earlier than
the eighth day. R. Hirsch explains that the
number seven symbolizes the complete world that God made in seven days. Eight represents the Jewish effort to
bring humanity to a higher level of perfection. Since this theme refers to a
specifically Jewish effort, it does not apply to the child of a non-Jewish
mother.
R.
Hirschs commentary on the
Torah also employs details to prove the true reasons for mitzvot. If lending money with interest is an
immoral practice that takes advantage of victims, it should be prohibited only
for the lender and not for the borrower.
Yet the Oral Law teaches that the borrower also violates a biblical
injunction. Why would the victim of
an immoral act also be seen as transgressing? Furthermore, since immoral
practices are prohibited toward our non-Jewish neighbors as well, why would the
Torah allow one to take interest from a Gentile? R. Hirsch understands that lending money with
interest is not immoral, since having money for a period of time truly is worth
money. The Torah prohibits this act because the lender and borrower should both
realize that all money fundamentally belongs to God, and God wants Jews to lend
money to their brethren without charging interest (see his commentary on
Shemot 22:28, Vayikra 25:36, and Devarim
23:20).
In Vayikra 25,
The Torah mentions the prohibition on interest in a section that also outlines
the laws of shemita (the injunction against working the land for one out
of every seven years, and the command to share freely any crops that grow on
their own during that year) and yovel (the fiftieth year, after seven
shemita cycles, which has the same laws as shemita). Those two commandments affirm divine
ownership of property and their juxtaposition to the laws of interest
support R.
Hirschs understanding. Thus,
R. Hirsch gives
us two methods for making rationales for mitzvot less speculative. We rely on the details of the
commandments to check our theories.
We also can infer something about the rationale from where the Torah
chooses to place certain mitzvot.
The prohibition
against mixing milk and meat is distinct from that of other forbidden foods,
where the Torah indicates that eating them will sully our soul. The Torah prohibits even the act of
cooking meat and milk together or deriving financial benefit from such a
mixture, where a person is obviously not consuming anything problematic. R. Hirsch suggests that we view the milk and meat
prohibition as more related to kilayim and shaatnez,
commandments that address the need to respect the divisions in Gods world
(commentary Shemot 23:19).
Required amounts can
also reveal the essential purpose of mitzvot. Some of the gifts given to the priestly
class by the rest of the nation are clearly meant to support these religious
leaders whose tribe did not receive a portion in the Land of Israel. An example would be the set tithes the
Levites give the priests, a tenth of the tenth they received from the
Israelites. However, other gifts such as teruma, the portion of grain
every Israelite was commanded to give the priests, and which the priests had to
consume in a state of ritual purity, or reishit ha-gez, the first of the
wool shearings have no biblical minimum and could not be intended as practical
means of support. R. Hirsch teaches that each of
these mitzvot conveys a symbolic message. Giving wool shearings to the priests
reminds us of our debt to the priests even though they do not contribute to
society in a material fashion (commentary Devarim 18:4). Teruma teaches the priests to
lead a sanctified life even in their own homes and not only in the Temple (commentary
Vayikra 22:9).
Discrepancies between
the details of seemingly parallel mitzvot also prove revealing. Why does Pesach conclude with an
atzeret on day seven, while Sukkot lasts for seven days and is
followed by an independent atzeret on day eight? R. Hirsch explains that atzeret days do not
teach new religious messages but rather enable the internalizing of the messages
from earlier festival days. They
are a time to stop and take stock of what we have learned. The seventh day of Pesach helps us
deepen our appreciation of Pesach themes.
Shemini Atzeret, on the other hand, is a time to reflect on everything we
have learned through the entire calendar of Jewish holidays. Since Pesach represents the first of the
pilgrimage festivals, the end of Sukkot brings the annual holiday cycle to a
close. As this day looks back at
every holiday and not just Sukkot, it is a distinct day that takes place after
the seven day Sukkot festival (commentary Vaykira
23:36).
R.
Hirschs analysis of the
Sabbath work prohibition (commentary Shemot 35:2) is particularly
insightful. The halakhic definition
of work clearly bears no relationship to amount of effort, since writing two
letters constitutes prohibited work while carrying a heavy couch around the
house does not. R. Hirsch explains that the
Torah prohibits creative labor.
Jews act creatively for six days but on the seventh we withdraw from
changing the world around us in recognition of Gods making and owning the
world. Writing two letters changes
the natural world, while moving heavy things about does
not.
A few forbidden
categories pose problems for this theory.
Trapping animals and gathering produce also seem to just move objects
around rather than change them.
R.
Hirsch explains that both of those categories involve taking an
item that was free and bringing it under human control. Even though no physical change occurs,
such acts fly in the face of Shabbats basic theme. On the Sabbath, we admit divine
ownership, instead of asserting human control.
Finally, the
prohibition against carrying poses a problem. Moving an item from ones house to the
public thoroughfare does not change the item nor does it assert human
ownership. R. Hirsch says that the
interaction between the public and the private symbolizes the social
domain. On Shabbat, we not only
affirm divine authority regarding the natural order but also regarding the
social arena. We convey that by
refraining from any transportation between individual and communal
areas.
Evaluation
The attempt to find
meaning in every halakhic detail sometimes can lead to forced and unconvincing
explanations. On the other hand,
the alternative idea that a large host of legal minutiae reflect nothing more
than the arbitrary need to give mitzvot an identity, seems difficult to
accept. R. Hirsch deserves credit for
his attempt to provide rationales for much of the detail. I find some of his explanations quite
convincing. Furthermore, his usage
of the details to check the accuracy of different explanations makes the entire
endeavor more precise and scientific.
How crucial is this
enterprise?
R.
Hirsch writes that the
commandments of the Torah are law, even if we have not uncovered the cause and
interrelationships of even a single one, and our fulfillments of the
commandments in no way depends upon the results of our investigation (The
Nineteen Letters, letter 18, footnote 4). If we just looked at this quote in
isolation, we might downplay the importance of suggesting rationales for
commandments. However, other
citations alter the picture, including the sentence that follows the previous
quote. Only the commandments
belonging to the category of Edot, which seek to convey insights and to
affect the emotions, remain incomplete without adequate investigation. Here, R. Hirsch posits that
fulfillment of the mitzvot of one of the Torahs six categories remains
incomplete absent investigations of the symbolic reasons for these
mitzvot. When we recall that
this category includes tzitzit, tefillin, mila, and all the
holidays, the endeavor of finding reasons for mitzvot grows in
importance.
Parts of letter 17 in
The Nineteen Letters see the absence of appreciation of the reasons for
the commandments as one of the causes of the modern spiritual malaise assailing
the Jewish community. The outward
rites of Judaism may still be familiar but how little is known of their inner
meaning. About the duties of the
Jew, they teach only their practical application, from handbooks complied for
this purpose, but not their meaning and inner spirit. Letter 18 speaks of Jews who have
inherited an uncomprehended Judaism
a revered but lifeless mummy which it is
afraid to bring back to life.
R.
Hirsch criticizes a Judaism that consists solely of practical
guides with no sense of the meaning and spirit of the law. Technical fulfillment of the law
(outside of the Edot) does not depend upon knowledge of the reasons for
commandments, but a more vibrant and robust Judaism does.
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