This week’s Torah commentary, written by Hebrew Seminary Rosh Yeshivah Rabbi Jonah Rank, has been sponsored anonymously.
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Not long after Hamas terrorists took more than 250 people as hostages on October 7, 2023, many rabbis were quick to recall Jewish wisdom’s teachings about the import of freeing those who have been unjustly held as prisoners. The itinerant Mediterranean physician and philosopher, Rabbi Mosheh ben Maimon (1138–1204) once forcefully claimed, “אין לך מצוה גדולה כפדיון שבויים” (“there is no mitzvah as great as redeeming those held in captivity”) (Mishneh Torah, Mattanot Aniyyim 8:10).
Although too many souls who died in captivity remain (as of this writing) unreturned—all of the living hostages from that tragic day have now been returned to Israel. In the minds of many, there may be no more meaningful return of hostages. If that is true, then the rudder of the religion of Maimonides (as ben Maimon was also called) needs to be suddenly redirected. With the last of the living hostages’ return on the morning preceding Simchat Torah in Israel, this sudden shift in the religious compass of the Jewish people aligns with the two questions that the holiday of Simchat Torah should beg of us. First, we should ask what about the Torah should compel us to search for meaning in it. Second, we should question if Maimonides even fully understood what the most important lesson of the Torah really is.
On Simchat Torah, after we conclude our reading of the Torah, we do not exactly move on to some ‘sequel’ to this sacred literature. Rather we roll the Torah back to the beginning and read it again. Chances are that on the second time through, we will understand the Torah better than we did the first time—and we will understand it even better the third time, the fortieth time, and the hundredth time. But, before we held the Torah we have now, how did our ancestors whose voices permeate the Hebrew Bible ascribe import to the Torah? What did our ancestors mean when they spoke about the Torah?
Sometimes the Bible called all of or any of God’s word “the Torah of Adonai” (“תורת יהוה,” torat Adonai) (Exodus 13:9; II Kings 10:31; Isaiah 30:9; Jeremiah 8:8; Amos 2:4; Psalms 1:2, 19:8, and 119:1; Ezra 7:10; Nehemiah 9:3; I Chronicles 16:40 and 22:12; and II Chronicles 12:1, 17:9, 31:3–4, 34:14, and 35:26). Because God is called by so many names, it makes some sense that the Bible would find a few different ways to talk about the Torah and its Author. While Joshua 24:26 references “the Torah of God” (“תורת אלהים,” torat Elohim); the Book of Nehemiah, when reintroducing the Israelites to a forgotten religion, speaks of “the Torah of the God” (“תורת האלהים,” torat ha’Elohim) (Nehemiah 8:8, 8:18, and 10:29–30). In a moment when the God of Hosea scolded the Jewish people, the Divine voice spoke, relationally, of “the Torah of your God” (“תורת אלהיכם,” torat Elohekha) (Hosea 4:6). In a quieter moment, the Psalmist imagined a righteous person in privacy finding “the Torah of his God” (“תורת אלהיו,” torat Elohav) (Psalm 37:31). The prophet Isaiah spoke, in grander terms, of “the Torah of our God” (“תורת אלהינו,” torat Eloheynu)—as well as “the Torah of the Lord of heavenly hosts” (“תורת יהוה צבאות,” torat Adonai tzeva’ot) (Isaiah 1:10 and 5:13 respectively). Addressing God in prayer, one Psalmist declared the awesomeness of “the Torah of Your mouth” (“תורת פיך,” torat pikha) (Psalm 119:72).
But sometimes our ancestors most associated the Torah with the leader who carried God’s law down from Mount Sinai. We therefore frequently read of “the Torah of Moses” (“תורת משה,” torat Mosheh) (Joshua 23:6; I Kings 2:3; II Kings 14:6 and 23:25; Malachi 3:22; Daniel 9:11 and 9:13; Ezra 3:2 and 7:6; Nehemiah 8:1; and II Chronicles 23:18 and 30:16). For the prophet Ezekiel, who—as an Israelite priest worked and perhaps even lived at the ancient Temple—the Torah mattered now that it was fully in human hands, and fully home. At God’s holy residence, where the ancient Israelite Temple stood in Jerusalem, Ezekiel spoke of “the Torah of the Home” (תורת הבית, torat habbayit) (Ezekiel 43:12).
But the Torah could not just be theoretical laws or unfulfilled promises. The application of the law is what most mattered for some of our ancestors. The prophet Malachi therefore spoke of “a Torah of truth” (“תורת אמת,” torat emet) (Malachi 2:6), and an ancient Jewish thinker in the Book of Proverbs praised “a Torah of lovingkindness” (“תורת חסד,” torat chesed) (Proverbs 31:26). Moreover, the seriousness that God’s Torah demanded inspired ancient Jews to consider the gravity of the teachings of human authorities. In the Book of Proverbs, the words of parents and sages bear such great weight that we read of “the Torah of your mother” (“תורת אמך,” torat immekha) (Proverbs 1:8 and 6:20) and “the Torah of a sage” (“תורת חכם,” torat chakham) (Proverbs 13:14).
Even before the Book of Proverbs was written though, the ancient Israelite kingdom was tasked with fulfilling God’s word. God’s vision for the world needed to be upheld, and King David prayed that God’s plan would come to fruition for more than just the Israelites alone. Rather, the monarch called God’s decrees “the Torah of humanity” (“תורת האדם,” torat ha’adam) (II Samuel 7:19).
The emotional sensibilities of the Jewish people never came to a clear consensus as to what single descriptor would most entice us to want to take hold of our Torah. In the piyyut (פיוט, “prayer-poem”) “אֲיֻמָּה הַמְשִׁי” (Ayummah Hamshi, “Awesome One, Raise Up”), the Yemenite sage Rabbi Shalom Shabazi (c. 1619–c. 1719), after asking for God to redeem and to protect the Jewish people, turned inward. Rabbi Shabazi urged his own poetic spirit, “וְקַח לָךְ רֵאשִׁית תּוֹרַת אֱמֶת חָכְמָה וּבִינָה” (“take in, for yourself, the beginning of a Torah of truth, wisdom, and understanding”). In an anonymously authored piyyut beginning with the words “אֲצַפֶּה עֵת בִּיאָתְךָ” (Atzappeh Et Bi’atekha, “I Await the Time of Your Arrival”), the poet announced to God, “וּבְךָ תּוֹרָה תּוֹרַת שַׁעֲשׁוּעִי” (uvkha torah, torat sha’ashu’I; “within you is a Torah—the Torah of my joy”). And, in a practice widespread now for approximately a millennium, every single morning, Jews around the world have concluded the blessings of their Amidah by acknowledging that God has blessed us with “a Torah of life” (תורת חיים, torat chayyim).
This “Torah of life,” for many like Maimonides, was all about freeing the captives. The Spanish Rabbi Yosef Chabiba (c. 1340–c. 1420) and Rabbi Aharon Hoken of Lunel (c. 1250–c. 1350) both agreed on this. (See, respectively, Nimmukey Yosef on the Babylonian Talmud, Megillah, chapter 4; and Orechot Chayyim, Din Tzedakah.) However, according to many of our spiritual forebears, this “Torah of life”—despite Maimonides’ assertion—was focused elsewhere. Writing in Acre in the Land of Israel, the French-born Rabbi Yehonatan of Lunel (c. 1135–1211) evidently thought that the most important mitzvah was providing financial support to students (Ketubbot, chapter 9). For the Spanish Rabbi Me’ir HaLevi Abulafia (c. 1170–1244), making peace between litigants was of utmost import (Kovetz Shittot Kamai on the Babylonian Talmud, Sanhedrin 6a). The Spanish-born (and Israel-bound) Nachmanides (c. 1194–1270) apparently thought that (maybe for Jews to stop the dangers of the Crusades) utter and devastating conquest of the Land of Israel was the foremost mitzvah (Kovetz Shittot Kamai on the Babylonian Talmud, Arakhin 23a). The German-born Rabbi Alexander Süsskind (Zuslin) HaKohen (d. 1349) wrote that the greatest mitzvah is actually any mitzvah that somebody chooses instead of performing a sin that feels convenient (Kovetz Shittot Kamai on the Babylonian Talmud, Kiddushin 40a). In medieval Western Europe, Rabbi Yitzchak ben Mosheh wrote that no mitzvah is greater than procreation (Or Zaru’a 676). A student among French sages, Rabbi David Estella (HaKokhavi) (c. 1250–c. 1350) believed Torah study to be the greatest of all commandments (Kovetz Shittot Kamai on the Babylonian Talmud, Shabbat 123b). Oddly enough, this point tantalized Maimonides, leading him to disagree with himself; Maimonides concluded that studying Torah was as important as all of the mitzvot combined (Mishneh Torah, Hilkhot Talmud Torah 3:3).
Jewish tradition ultimately asserts that Judaism is a religion about and for the living—whether they be on a warfront, in a study hall, or in a bassinet. In all times, and in all places, our central text should lead us to ask questions about how we conduct our lives morally, sacredly, and wisely. In a certain sense, we should find comfort in the fact that the rabbis could not agree on which single Jewish act or value best exemplifies our breathing the life of Torah. Their lives—their Torahs—inevitably differed from one another; they emerged from their studies reaching different conclusions. The Jewish people have found meaning not in a monolithic doctrine but in a poetic tradition that is up for our own interpretation. The Torah attracts us, not because it has the answers, but, through posing challenges to us, the Torah gives us room to contemplate what it means for us to be created in the divine image. This truth, which God declares in this Shabbat’s Torah reading (Genesis 1:26) should inspire us to treat our loved ones, our neighbors, and even strangers with the reverence we owe God. The sage Ben Azzai believed that this lesson was the most fundamental belief of our religion. (See Sifra, Kedoshim 4:12; regarding Genesis 5:1.) Anything suggesting otherwise would violate the greatest principal underlying our Torah. Anything suggesting otherwise means that we did not even understand the first few chapters of the book we thought we finished.
At this time, Israelis and Palestinians await a whole peace—and contradicting ideas on how to achieve that peace suggest that there will be painful stumbling blocks ahead. We know that too many people are still grieving losses sustained during and since the horrors of October 7, and we hope that—and, if we can, we act so that—those who are suffering now may find some solace. The most important part of the Torah today might not be freeing hostages, but it will be ensuring that a Torah of life is granted not just to rabbis, to students, or to the whole of the Jewish people; rather, we take, not a page, but a book from Ben Azzai and King David. In whatever ways we now emphasize the core values of the Torah, we must center ourselves on the betterment of all humankind.
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