Demythologising
the Rabbinic Aggadah: Menahem Meiri
by Louis Jacobs
Many of the
mediaeval Jewish teachers, partly in defence of the Talmud against attack
by the Karaites, partly because of their own rationalistic stance, engaged in what
Marc Saperstein in a fine study [1] has called ‘decoding the Rabbis’. That is
to say, passages, especially in the Talmudic Aggadah, which seemed to them
offensive to reason and general religious sensibilities, these teachers
interpreted in the light of their own philosophical views, treating the Talmudic Aggadah
as if it were a code requiring to be deciphered. Whether or not the ancient
Rabbis could have intended to say what these thinkers understood them to have
said, whether the Talmudic literature does ever partake of a code, is, of
course, quite another matter. Rabbinic thought, whatever else it is, is hardly
in the philosophical and systematic vein [2].
This kind of
allegorical interpretation of the Talmudic Aggadah, this demythologisation,
is found among the Geonim [3], in Maimonides, [4) and even, on occasion, in
Rashi [5]. the great French commentator usually indifferent to the philosophical
approach. As Solomon Schechter said of the mediaeval French and German schools,
they nether neither understood nor misunderstood Aristotle. It is not always
appreciated, however, that Menahem Meiri of Perpignan (1249-1316) [6] employs
this method throughout his voluminous commentaries to the Talmud as this essay
seeks to demonstrate. (The page references are not to the numbers in the
various editions of Meiri's Bet Ha-Behirah but to the pagination of the
Talmudic tractates on which he comments).
Without stating
it explicitly, Meiri usually allows his readers to see for themselves that his
interpretations are intended to avoid attributing to the Talmudic Sages
perverse, superstitious or ridiculous notions even though a surface reading of
the tests might seem to imply that such notions are acceptable. The following
provide examples of Meiri at work in this connection. They are arranged under a
number of headings but these are not to be taken too categorically since there
is considerable overlapping and do not appear in Meiri's own writings. Meiri's
chief aim is to explain the Talmudic texts as these appear in the order of the
tractates. His methodology has to be assessed by implication.
Anthropomorphism
On the statement
(Bava Batra 25a) that the Shekhinah is in the West. Meiri remarks that
this in no way implies that God has any spatial location (‘Heaven forbid,’ Meiri
adds) but only to indicate that it is preferable not to face East in prayer in
order to protest against worshippers of the sun which rises in the East. Nowadays, we do
face East in our prayers, adds Meiri, but that is in order to face Jerusalem.
The passage (Berakhot
6a) in which it is stated that the Shekhinah is present when ten
assemble in the synagogue for prayer, is interpreted psychologically
by Meiri: ‘Whenever a man is able to offer his prayers in the synagogue he
should do so since there proper concentration of the heart is possible. They
[the Rabbis] have laid down a great principle that communal prayer is
desirable and that those who offer their prayers in the synagogue where ten are
present the Shekhinah is with them’, This means, presumably, that the ability
to concentrate adequately on the prayers is for the worshippers to be nearer to
the Shekhinah and hence the Shekhinah is with them.
In the same
Talmudic passage it is stated that where three judges sit together judging a
case the Shekhinah is with them and when two scholars study the Torah together,
instead of each one on his own, their words are recorded in 'the book of
remembrance' (Malachi 3:16). Evidently, in order to avoid ascribing a spatial
location to the Shekhinah and in order to avoid the suggestion that there is a
book ‘up there’, Meiri paraphrases:
Let
a man take care not to judge a case on his own and should always be one of
three judges. For wherever there are three judges, two of them will argue it
out while the third one will clarify the matter and weigh it up. In this way they
will avoid error and it will be said of them that the Shekhinah is with them.
And so it is with regard to the study of the Torah. Even though this is
desirable and praiseworthy whenever it occurs, where there are two who study
together it is far better for as a result there will be a greeter clarification
of the truth. Furthermore, since each one debates the subject with the other,
the subjects studied become more firmly fixed in their memory. This is what the
author of the saying meant when he said that where two are present their words
are recorded in the book of remembrance.
Meiri has a
similar comment of the passage (Berakhot 6b) that when God comes to the synagogue
and does not find the quorum of ten present there at the time of communal
prayer He is immediately angry. Meiri remarks:
Let
the members of a community be energetic in arriving at the synagogue as soon as
the time of prayer has begins. For when time of prayer has come and there is no
quorum in the synagogue it is most disgraceful, demonstrating that the hearts
of people in that city are distant from God and such distance constitutes the
greatest anger and the worst form of wrath. This is what they [the Rabbis]
intended when they said God is immediately angry.
Meiri is
evidently bothered not only by the notion of God coming to the synagogue,
another spatial location, but also by the gross anthropomorphism that God
becomes immediately angry. Meiri hence understands God's coming to the
synagogue to mean that when the members of the community fail to arrive in the
proper time their failure to ‘come’ nearer to God represents His coming to the
synagogue, as if to say, He is ever ready to hearken to their prayer but they
have missed the opportunity and such lack of care constitutes divine wrath.
Again, Meiri is
bothered by the Talmudic statement (Berakhot 32a) in which God is made to
say to Moses: ‘You have revived Me with your words.’ In the Introduction to
his Commentary to tractate Avot, Meiri states that the meaning is, by
Moses' demonstration that God's existence is necessary rather than contingent
God became a living reality for them.
A particularly
interesting interpretation by Meiri is given to the passage (Shabbat
12b) in which it is stated that, except when praying on behalf of a sick person,
prayers should not be recited in Aramaic, a language the ministering angels do
not understand. Prayers for the sick can be recited in this language since the
Shekhinah is already present when a person is sick. On a surface reading, the
passage means that the ministering angels who do not understand Aramaic cannot
bring the prayers to the Throne of God when the prayers are in Aramaic but,
where the prayers are on behalf of the sick the mediation of the angels can be
dispensed with since the Shekhinah is already there. Meiri’s interpretation
relies on the passage (Berakhot 6a), in which it is stated that the
Shekhinah is present when prayers are offered in the synagogue. Thus Meiri
writes:
Let
not a man ever offer supplication for his needs in Aramaic since this language
is not fluent in the mouths of people and they will fail to concentrate
adequately in prayers offered in a language they do not sufficiently
understand. Nevertheless since with regard to a sick person there is a greater
degree on concentration there is nothing to fear. And so do the Geonim write
with regard to communal prayers that these can be recited in any language since
the Shekhinah is with the community, meaning that the Shekhinah is with them.
Meiri here seems
to understand the saying about the ministering angels as it were ironic. The
Aramaic language is foreign even to the ministering angels who are good at
languages. All the more is it foreign to ordinary folk. Thus Meiri neatly
side-steps the notion of the angels having to bring the prayers to God. Just as
in communal prayer the Shekhinah is there, namely, the type of concentration
expressed by the presence of the Shekhinah (as above) so, too, where prayers
are offered for the sick, the degree of concentration is sufficiently intense
for it to denote the presence of the Shekhinah. There is adequate concentration
even when the prayers are offered in a foreign language
Magic and
Superstition
In his
commentary to the verse: ‘The simpleton believes everything’ (Proverbs 14:15) Meiri
observes that the question whether demons exist is a matter not of faith but of
investigation. [7] There is no categorical denial of the existence of demons.
Nevertheless, throughout his commentaries Meiri prefers to understand Talmudic
references to demons in a non-literal fashion.
In tractate Avot
(5:8) an opinion is stated that mazikin were created at twilight of the first
Sabbath of Creation. The word mazikin (the ‘harmful ones’) is usually understood as
the malevolent demons. But Meiri renders it as ‘things not normally found in
the natural order’ and he puts forward a further idea that the term denotes the
yetzer ha-ra (evil inclination). This inclination is undoubtedly harmful
but also beneficial to human life since it provides humans with life's driving
force. Hence it is a twilight thing, belonging and yet not belonging to the
beneficent aspect of creation.
The statement in
tractate Eruvin (43a) regarding the vast distances covered on the Sabbath by
one Joseph the Demon by flying in the air seems to be understood by Meiri as
denoting a skilful acrobat performing devil dare acts flying through the air
(on stilts?).[9] On the statement (Berakhot 3a) that one of the reasons
why it is forbidden to enter a ruin is because of mazikin, Meiri
paraphrases this as ‘anything that may cause harm’. On the statement (Berakhot
4b) regarding the recital of the Shema before retiring to sleep, Meiri quotes
the Jerusalem Talmud (Berakhot 1:1, 2d) that the purpose of this recital
is to drive away the mazikin. Meiri notes that the definite article is
used, ha-mazikin, ‘the mazikin’ which, he says, refers to the
known harmful ones, namely, thoughts of unbelief which tend to invade the mind
when man is on his bed and against which the recital of the Shema is the antidote.
This is why the Talmud exempts a scholar from the recital since such a person
is immune, in any event, to heretical or idolatrous thoughts [10].
A well-known
Talmudic passage (Bava Kama 21a), dealing with the question of whether a
squatter has to pay rent, proved embarrassing to Meiri since the law seems to depend
on a belief in demons. The teacher Rav is reported as saying, one who occupies
a neighbour's premises without having an agreement so to do is under no
obligation to pay rent. This is because Scripture (Isaiah 24:12) says: ‘Through
Sheiyyah even the gate gets smitten’. The usual translation of Sheiyyah is ‘emptiness’
or ‘desolation’. But the Talmud seems to understand Sheiyyah as a demon i.e. the
squatter benefits the owner of the premises since by living in the premises he
keeps away the demon Sheiyyah who haunts uninhabited houses. The Talmud adds
that Mar son of Rav Ashi said: ‘I saw him myself and he resembled a goring ox’.
Meiri simply writes that the squatter benefits the owner since an empty house
becomes desolate there being no one to take care of it properly, understanding
Sheiyyah as ‘desolation’. Meiri ignores the report of Mar son of Rav Ashi,
unless he understands this teacher to be saying that the effect of leaving as
house empty and desolate is as if a wild ox had been let loose there.
On the famous
Talmudic passage (Sukkah 28a), where it is said that Rabban Johanan ben
Zakkai knew ‘the speech of the demons, the speech of palm trees, and the speech
of the ministering angels’, Meiri offers the explanation that he knew how to
talk about these creatures, not that he understood what these creatures were
saying. Among some of the Geonim there was a tradition according to which if a
sheet was spread between two palm trees it could serve as a means of divination
and this is ‘the speech of the palm trees’ which Rabban Johanan ben Zakkai
knew. Meiri prefers to understand the passage in a non-magical way,
paraphrasing the whole as: ‘matters of great wisdom regarding the natural order
of the universe and the supernatural’.
Meiri is
certainly not unaware that there are passages in the Talmud based on superstitious
beliefs. Unwilling to accuse the Talmudic Rabbis of really entertaining such
beliefs, Meiri has recourse to the idea that, while the Rabbis themselves did
not believe in the superstitions, they were prepared to tolerate them as a sop
to the ignorant masses for whom certain ideas has become so firmly fixed in
their minds that nothing could be done to eradicate them. A good example of
this attitude is Meiri's comment to the Talmudic passage (Pesahim
109b-110b) on the avoidance of zuggot (‘pairs’), things that come in
even numbers. Here the Talmud states that one should not eat an even number of
items of food or drink an even number of cups of wine at the same meal. In that
case, the Talmud asks, why do we drink four cups of wine on Passover at the
Seder? The reply is that Scripture says of this night: ‘It is a night of
guarding’ (Exodus 12:42), which verse is taken to mean: ‘lt is a night of
guarding from the mazikin’.
Here Meiri could
hardly ignore the fact that the Rabbis must mean understand the term mazikin
as harmful spirits who attack those who eat or drink by 'pairs' who are
powerless to carry out their nefarious designs on this single night. Meiri's
comment should be quoted in full as indicative of his opposition to
superstition while acknowledging that superstitions are found frequently,
especially in the Babylonian Talmud.
We
have often explained that in those times people were attracted to vulgar things
such as incantations, divinations, and other such base practices. For as these
did not partake of the ways of the Amorites [the Talmudic term for illegal;
practices with pagan associations] the Sages did not bother to eradicate them,
still less those which had become too deeply fixed in their [the masses'] minds
whether their belief be strong or weak. As this very passage attests: ‘One who
takes it seriously it has an effect. One who refuses to take it seriously it
has no effect’ Belonging to these topics is that which comes in pairs. Now when
the Sages ordained the drinking of the four cups and refused to tolerate either
diminution nor addition because of such ridiculous notions, they were obliged
to state a reason for a departure from that to which they [the masses] had
become accustomed. So they gave the reason that this night is one of protection
from the demons.
Meiri adopts a
similar line in many of his commentaries.
Another striking
example of Meiri avoiding a too stark and crude invocation of
the supernatural
is his comment to the passage (Kiddushin 70a) that when a man marries a
woman unfit for him ‘Elijah binds him and the Holy One, blessed be He,
flagellates him.’ Meiri understands this to refer to a woman unfit to be
married to the man because she is of base ancestry, though her actual legal
status is uncertain. Since she comes from a disreputable family this might be
an indication that she is legally unfit. Meiri continues:
lt
is with this in mind that they [the Rabbis] say that Elijah binds him. That is
to say, philologically and in popular usage Elijah denotes the clarification of
doubtful cases [11] so that her doubtful status will cause him constant
anxiety, this being expressed by him being bound, until he will eventually come
to realise that he will never enjoy any blessing from her and he will come to
appreciate that she is really legally unfit for him. This is the meaning of
‘the Holy One, blessed be He, flagellates him’. This is a parable for the
punishment he deserves.
Dreams
Meiri, in his
major extant work, the Bet Ha-Behirah, generally confines his detailed
comments to the Halakhic passages, though he frequently quotes the Aggadah where
this has practical consequences and thus becomes Halakhah in a sense. He does
not explore in any depth lengthy Aggadic passages which have no practical
application. It is, consequently, not surprising that he has only one comment
on the famous passage on dreams in tractate Berakhot (55a-57b). The
passage contains the formula for ‘making good’ a bad dream (Berakhot
55b). If a man has had a bad dream he should assemble three men and say to
them: ‘l have had a good dream’ and they should say to him: ‘Good it is and let
it be good. May the All-Merciful turn it to good: seven times may it be decreed
concerning thee from Heaven that it be good and may it be good.’ They should
then recite three Scriptural verses in which the word ‘turn’ occurs; three
verses in which the word ‘redeem’ occurs; and three verses in which the word
‘peace’ occurs.
The passage
continues that if as man has had a dream the true nature of which he does not
know, he should stand in front of the priests when they recite the Priestly Blessing
and offer a prayer, given in the passage and later incorporated into various
liturgies that his dream be turned to good (i.e. if it is really a bad omen).
All this, obviously partaking of the magical, proved extremely puzzling to the
philosophical mind. Meiri does, in fact, refer to the formula as a lahash
(‘incantation’) but proceeds to soften the starker magical elements in the
procedure, by, as his wont, understanding the procedure more for the
psychological than the magical effect. Meiri writes: ‘Whenever a man is troubled, even
by a very minor thing, he should scrutinise his deeds and allow it to bring him
to repentance. Even when all that happens to him is no more than the fright
caused by a bad dream, he should examine [his deeds] and should worry about it
so that it moves him to repentance. If it [the dream] has made him very anxious
he should go to three men and say to them . . .’ Meiri continues with the
formula given in the Talmudic passage. Interestingly he reads the ‘incantation’
as actually saying: ‘seven times may it be decreed’ and he rejects the version
according to which the formula be recited seven times, presumably because a
sevenfold repetition would smack too much of the magical.
Meiri also seeks
to avoid the magical element in the resort to the Priestly Blessing: ‘If he
saw a dream the nature of which he cannot fathom, not knowing whether it is
good or bad so that his soul is disturbed, he should arrange [to present his
special prayer] for the time when the congregation has particularly strong
intention, namely at the time of prayer, and certainly at the time when the
priests raise their hands and the congregation responds with Amen with special
concentration, and he should then offer his own prayer.’ Meiri is obviously
concerned lest the Priestly Blessing itself be used as a form of incantation.
The time of the Priestly Blessing is a time when the congregation is especially
attuned to concentration and this will help the individual to concentrate on
his plight causing him to repent. Here, again, Meiri's stress on the
psychological benefits, on the subjective rather than the objective. lt is not
a question of a man removing his anxieties by the utterance of certain words
but by removing his anxieties by improving his character. As Evelyn Underhill
has put it, the difference between magic and mysticism is that magic takes
while mysticism gives.
Figurative
Explanation
Meiri frequently
states explicitly that, in his opinion, the Rabbis say this or that only as a
parable or a hint at some good practice and that they never intended that what
they say be taken literally. On the statement in the Talmud (Kiddushin
50b) that God created the Torah as an antidote to the yetzer ha-ra
(‘evil inclination’) just as a human king who has wounded his son will provide
the son with a plaster to keep on the would to prevent it festering, Meiri
comments: ‘Whosoever is diligent in his study of the Torah, even if he has
sinned because of the power over him of the evil inclination and he has grown
up with evil defects of character, the Torah will shield him. That is to say,
it is impossible for the Torah not to train him to overcome them [the evil
defects of character] and not to prevent him from becoming submerged in them.’
Meiri them quotes the parable of the king and his son and says: ‘They said ‘by
way of note.’” Clearly, Meiri is anxious, as always, to avoid attributing
quasi-magical powers to the study of the Torah. The study of the Torah enables
the student himself to become a better person.
A similar
interpretation by Meiri is of the Talmudic passage (Rosh Ha-Shanah 16b)
which states that when a man is in trouble he should change the place where he
resides and change his name. A surface reading might convey the thought, totally
unacceptable to a thinker like Meiri, that a man can prevent God's judgment by
escaping to another place where God cannot find him (reminiscent of Jonah) or
by changing his name. Meiri sees in the change of place and of name as no more
than devices through which a man becomes another person i.e. by causing him to
give up his former bad ways, repenting and making a new start in life [12].
Similarly, on
the statement (Berakhot 7b) that when a man has a fixed place in which
to offer his prayers, his enemies fall before him, Meiri (evidently having the
reading ‘fixed place for his studies’, not ‘for his prayers’ as in the current
edition) paraphrases it as:
Even
if a man finds himself broad of heart, with a quick grasp and a good memory, he
should not be soft on himself by failing to have a fixed place [a permanent
place in which to study]. Whoever does have a fixed place will be successful in
his studies and obtain the victory over those who disagree with him. This is
the meaning of ‘his enemies will fall before him’.
Again Meiri is
anxious to avoid any suggestion that the Torah is a magical weapon by means of
which the student's foes are vanquished. The ‘enemies’ are colleagues of whom
the student will get the better when thy argue things out since, as a result of
him having a fixed place for his studies, he has become more proficient in
learning.
Meiri takes in a
non-literal fashion [13] the teachings about the neshamah yeterah
(‘additional soul’) with which man is endowed on the Sabbath (Beitzah
15a). This has to be understood not that a man has more than one soul on the
Sabbath but that his soul is enlarged. Free from material concerns on the
Sabbath, man devotes himself to spiritual things in a manner of which he
incapable on the ordinary days of the week The neshamah yeterah refers
to greater soulfulness, a more powerful experience of the spiritual life.
Meiri. in his
commentary [14] to tractate Avot, quotes the Midrash (Genesis
Rabbah, chapter
1) in which it is stated that the Holy One, blessed be He, looked
into the Torah
and then created the world. The surface meaning of this is that God used the
Torah as an architect uses his blueprint! This is how the Midrash is conventionally
and undoubtedly correctly understood. But Meiri finds it more in line with
philosophical thinking to understand the saying to mean that God foresaw that
He was to give the Torah that would keep mankind on the right path and He
therefore created the world. Similarly, in his comment on the statement (Avot
2:1) ‘All thy deeds are written in a book.’ Meiri refuses to treat this as a
kind of divine book-keeping but understands it to mean that a man should see
his sins as if they were written in a book and which therefore cannot be erased
except by resentence.
On the statement
(Avot 2:14) ‘Warm thyself by the fire of the sages; but beware of their
glowing coals’, Meiri is at pains to point out that this does not mean that the
sages have a kind of death ray with which they harm those who come too near to
them. According to Meiri the meaning is that one should be warmed through the
nearness of the sages but should not become too familiar with them. The saying
expresses the need to draw a balance between the familiarity that breeds
contempt and the remoteness that is conducive to respect.
Meiri belongs
firmly in both the Halakhic and the philosophical traditions, with the emphasis
on the former. Or rather he explains both the Halakhah and the Aggadah of the
Talmud in such a way as to satisfy both the Halakhic and the philosophical mind.
Yet every student of this master's works knows that his style is all his own, a
skillful and harmonious blend of the various trends of thought in his age which
has a not inconsiderable attractiveness to modernists as well. This explains
why, though the majority of his works have only seen the light of publication
in comparatively recent times, they have been republished many times and have
won such popularity that they now take their place beside Rashi and the
Tosafists as essential guides to the Talmud.
Notes
[1] Marc
Saperstein, Decoding the Rabbis: A Thirteenth Century Commentary on the Aggadah, Harvard University Press, 1980. The
‘Thirteenth Century Commentary’ is
that of the hitherto unknown, Provencal scholar, Isaac ben Yedaiah, a
contemporary of Meiri.
[2] On the
problem of the Rabbinic Aggadah see Krochmal, Moreh Nevukhey Ha-Zeman, chapter 14, in The Writings of
Nachman Krochmal, ed. S. Rawidowicz, London, 1961,
pp. 238-256. On Rabbinic thinking as ‘organic’ rather than systematic, see
Max Kadushin, The Rabbinic Mind. New York, 1965.
[3] See e.g. Otzar
Ha-Geonim, ed. B.M. Lewin, vol. I, Berakhot, Haifa, 1928, pp. 2-3, on Elijah's
conversation with R. Jose, and pp. 130-132 on earth rumblings. See my Theology
in the Responsa, London, 1975, pp. 6-10.
[4] See
Maimonides' Commentary to the Mishnah, Shabbat 2:5. that the ‘evil
spirit’ mentioned in the Mishnah means a form of melancholia and Maimonides'
strong approval (Guide, III, 22) of the saying of R. Simeon ben Lakish (Bava
Batra 16a): ‘Satan, the evil inclination and the angel of death are one and
the same.’
[5] See Rashi's
comment on the story of the Rabbi who challenged Satan (Sukkah 38a)
which Rashi understands as a challenge to man's own evil inclination rather an
external force. Cf R. Nissim of Gerona, the Ran, to Rosh Ha-Shanah 16b
that blowing the shofar to confuse Satan means to confuse the evil inclination.
[6] For the
little known about the life of Meiri see the article by I. Ta-Shema in the Encyclopedia
Judaica, vol. 11, pp. 1257-1260 and Saperstein. op. cit., index
‘Menahem Meiri’.
[7] This
reference is given in Sefer Ha-Middot Le-Ha-Meiri, ed. M. M.
Meshi-Zahav,
Jerusalem, 1967,
p. 100, based on a Vatican manuscript of Meiri's Commentary to Proverbs. There
is a comprehensive examination of Meiri’s view on superstition in Marc Shapiro,
‘Maimonidean Halakhah and Supersition,’ in Maimonidean Studies, ed.
Arthur Hyman, vol. 4, New York, 2000, pp. 61-108.
[8] Cf. Meiri to
Makkot 6b on a warning given by a demon (shed) which Meiri
understands as
pure hyperbole (derekh mashal) and Meiri on the statement (Hullin
91a) that a scholar should not go out alone at night because the mazikin
might harm him, paraphrased by Meiri as: ‘people may be envious of him and harm
him’. In his comment to Taanit 22b Meiri understands a man afflicted by
an evil spirit to be a man suffering from hallucinations.
[9] Meiri adds
that the report in the passage about Elijah travelling vast distances refers to
a skilful acrobat who, like Elijah, covers huge distance at one go and that
Joseph the Demon was such an acrobat.
[10] In all
probability Meiri is hinting here at Christian doctrines.
[11] Elijah is
associated with the resolving of doubt in the Mishnah (Eduyot 8:7)
and see my TEYKU:
The Unsolved Problem in the Babylonian Talmud, London,
New
York, 1981, p. 235.
[12] This
comment of Meiri is based on Maimonides. Yad, Teshuvah 2:4 but Meiri
stresses the
psychological effect to a greater degree.
[13] Hibbur
Ha-Teshuvah, ed. Abraham Schreiber, Jerusalem, 1976, II, 12, p. 531.
[14] ed. B. Z.
Prag, Jerusalem, 1964, Avot 1:1, ed. Prag p. 5.
