When a man takes a wife and is intimate with her, and it happens that she does not find favor in his eyes because he discovers in her an unseemly matter,

and he writes for her a bill of divorce and places it into her hand,

and sends her away from his house.

(Devarim 24:1)

 

Beit Shammai say: A man should not divorce his wife unless he has found her guilty of some unseemly conduct, as it says, because he discovers in her an unseemly matter. But Beit Hillel say [that he may divorce her] even if she has merely spoilt his food, since it says, because he discovers in her an unseemly matter. R. Akiva says [he may divorce her] even if he finds another women more beautiful than she is, as it says, and it happens that she does not find favor in his eyes.

(Mishnah Gittin 9:10)

 

R. Eleazar said: If a man divorces his first wife, even the altar sheds tears, as it says, And this second thing you do, to cover the altar of the Lord with tears, weeping, and sighing-such that He will no longer turn to the offering, nor will He take anything willingly from your hand. And you will say, "Why?"-Because the Lord testified between you and the wife of your youth, that you dealt treacherously with her, and she is your companion and the wife of your covenant (Malachi 2:13-14).

(Gittin 90b)

 

even the altar sheds tears, etc. The interpretation [of this dictum]: That you have no connection or cleaving like that between a man and his wife, and in particular his first wife. For regarding his first wife a bat kol goes forth and announces, "The daughter of so-and-so is to [be married to] so-and-so" and therefore the connection and cleaving are absolute. The altar is the connection and cleaving between Israel and their Father in Heaven, and that is why the Torah commands us not to wield iron over the stones of the altar, for it is said, lest you wield your sword upon it and desecrate it (Shemot 20), that iron should not be wielded [over its stones, because iron] which cuts and destroys should not be wielded over the altar, which makes peace between Israel and their Father in Heaven. And Israel is called in Scripture the wife of the Holy One, blessed be He, and the altar is the connection and cleaving between Israel and their Father in Heaven, and therefore he said that the altar sheds tears. The connection and cleaving between man and wife is an essential connection, for so they were created and they became one flesh, and its loss is considered to be a loss for the altar, for it [the altar] is also a connection between man and wife, as we have explained. And therefore he said that the altar sheds tears for him, for tears are a loss to the one who cries, for when death comes to a person those who are close to him - flesh of his flesh - cry for him, for this loss belongs to him [the one close to departed] as it belongs to the one who actually died, and therefore he sheds tears, which is a loss. And when one divorces his first wife he detaches something that is essentially connected, and this is considered as if the loss affected the altar as well in the latter's being the connection between Israel and their father in Heaven.

(MaHaRaL MiPrague, Hiddushei Aggadot, pg. 142, Tractate Sanhedrin)

 

Moses' Sense of Timing

Gil Nativ

Moses waited almost forty years until he was ready to instruct the People Israel in the steppes of Moab: Do not despise an Egyptian, for you were a stranger in his land (Devarim 23:8). It is not difficult to imagine what would have happened - God forbid - if Moses had uttered those words at Mount Sinai seven weeks after the Exodus from Egypt. They would have gathered around shouting angrily: "Do not despise an Egyptian!?! Who are you, you slow-of-speech leftist, to preach morals to us?! How would you feel if they kidnapped your baby, a baby you had so yearned for, and threw it into the Nile to feed the crocodiles? You never worked at hard labor from sun up to sun down under the whip of an Egyptian task-master! You grew up spoiled in the palace of an evil tyrant and you have the nerve to tell us not to despise them?! Run home to Pharaoh's palace and preach your morals there!" Moses knew that just as it is a mitzvah to say things that can be heard, so too it is a mitzvah not to say things that cannot be heard. Therefore he waited until the generation that left Egypt had passed from the world and only then he uttered the commandment, do not despise an Egyptian to a generation which had never felt the lashes of an Egyptian whip.

Rashi differentiates between the various nations mentioned in parashat Ki Tetze: on the one hand there are the Amonites and Moabites "who did not greet you with bread and water... and who hired Balaam against you... to curse you," while on the other hand there are nations who tried to destroy Israel: the Edomites by the sword, and the Egyptians through drowning. It is with the former that marriage is eternally prohibited, while the others are permitted from the third generation, "thus you learn that one who tries to cause someone to sin is worse than the one who tries to kill him; for the killer kills him in this world, but one who causes sin removes him from both this world and the next." Philosophical-historical perspective is required to accept Rashi's comment. It is impossible to convince a Holocaust survivor that it is wrong to despise Germans because they only wanted to destroy Israel physically but did not try to convince us to abandon our faith or to "sin" and thus lose our portion in the world to come...

How was Moses able to say do not despise an Egyptian when he had personally witnessed his brothers' suffering and even killed an Egyptian task-master who was abusing his fellow Israelite? Moses also saw the Egyptians from a different vantage point during the years he grew up in Pharaoh's palace. The Israelites only knew the Egyptians through taskmasters' lashes and Pharaoh's decrees of persecution. Moses, whose body and soul had not been hardened by arduous labor, knew not only the Egypt's aggressiveness and cruelty; he also knew of its science. He was acquainted with the experience, beauty, and wisdom of the nation's sages, the magicians and embalmers. Moses came to know and incorporate within himself and his leadership style not just two cultures, but three: he also spent years tending his father-in-law's flocks in the wilderness. Thus he possessed three points of view and his world was three dimensional.

Moses learned first and foremost that every nation - including his own - contains good, evil, and mediocre people. There were people of conscience among the Egyptians, such as Shifra and Puah, the Egyptian¹ midwives who helped the Hebrew women; they identified with the suffering of the Hebrews and were even prepared to endanger themselves by refusing to follow Pharaoh's orders. Some Egyptians were motivated by political realism (and not necessarily by humanism) to understand that it is impossible to enslave an entire nation for the long run. Their voices became prominent as the plagues grew worse, and they tried to convince Pharaoh, "How long will this one be a stumbling block to us? Let the people go and they will worship their God. Don't you yet know that Egypt is lost?" (Shemot 10:7).

Was there another side to the coin of enslavement in Egypt? From our standpoint, the Egyptians were ungrateful towards Joseph's people and Pharaoh was an anti-Semite who made false accusations against the Israelites, claiming that they were a fifth column waiting for an opportunity to join Egypt's enemies. Moses could understand - even if he did not agree with - the Egyptian point of view: "The Israelites had promised upon their arrival that, We have come to sojourn in the land because there is no pasture for the flocks... since the famine is heavy in the land of Canaan (Bereishit 47:4). That is to say: 'We did not come to settle permanently in Egypt. We will return to our land when conditions improve there.' But the seven years of famine had ended more than a generation ago and still the Hebrews are in our land and show no indication that they intend to return to the land promised them by their God. They do not try to engage in agriculture like us Egyptians, instead they insist on persisting in their disgusting shepherding. While it's true that there was a Hebrew named Joseph who saved the country by interpreting dreams and storing up grain in the years of plenty, must we remain indebted to his relatives for ever? And furthermore, in Joseph's day they constituted a "clan" numbering seventy souls, but thanks to their rate of reproduction they are already a large nation, and we might eventually find ourselves to be a minority in our own land." So began the breakdown of relations between Egypt and the descendants of Jacob and Joseph. That is why Rashi takes the opportunity to praise Egypt: "Even though they threw your male [infants] into the Nile... What is the reason [not to despise them]? Because they sheltered you in desperate times." Hosting the seventy members of Jacob's family during the famine years is not something to be taken for granted. Not every nation is prepared to open its doors to refugees from troubled and hungry lands. That is why we are commanded to remember not only the persecution by Egyptians of later years, but also the favor they showed us early in our encounter with them.

1. The idea that Shifra and Puah were Egyptians can already be found in the writings of Philo of Alexandria, in Midrash Tadshe, and in the works of the Abarbanel, ShaDaL, and Malbim. See Pinchas Peli's book, Torah Today and Nehama Leibowitz's Iyyunim BeSefer Shemot pp. 31-33), which cites several commentators who support this view.

Rabbi Gil Nativ

 

If a man commits a sin for which he is sentenced to death, and he is put to death, you shall [then] hang him on a pole. But you shall not leave his body on the pole overnight. Rather, you shall bury him on that [same] day, for a hanging [human corpse] is a blasphemy of God, and you shall not defile your land, which the Lord, your God, is giving you as an inheritance.

(Devarim 21:22-23)

 

For a hanging [human corpse] is a blasphemy of God: This is a degradation of the [Divine] King in Whose image man is created, and the Israelites are God’s children. This is comparable to two identical twin brothers. One [of them] became king, while the other was arrested for robbery and hanged. Whoever saw him [the second brother, suspended on the gallows], would say, “The king is hanging!” Wherever [the term] klala [curse/blasphemy] appears in Scripture, it means treating lightly [hakel] and degrading. For the term example, [And behold, you have with you Shimei the son of Gera...] and he cursed me with a severe curse (I Kings 2:8).

(Rashi Devarim 21:23, based on Judaica Press translation)

 

For a hanging [human corpse] is a blasphemy of God - That the person was hung for cursing God, for a blasphemer is stoned to death and hung, and that is the point of you shall not leave, for it is customary to hang blasphemers, but I tell you: do not leave any corpse to hang, lest those who see it say: "He was a blasphemer and he raised his hand against the King" for that insults the King. It is as if a man came along and slapped the king's face and tore out his hair and beard; even though the king had him hung, it insults the king, for it will be spoken of and publicized that a man slapped the king, and therefore he should not be hung. And some explain a blasphemy of God [elohim] as saying that when people see a hung corpse they curse the judges who sentenced him; by having compassion for a hung poor person they can end up transgressing, for it is written, Do not curse a judge [elohim, which usually means "god" here means "judge"]. And our rabbis exposited upon [the verse] klalat elohim ["blasphemy of God"] that when a person suffers or is humiliated, the Divine Presence says, so to speak, "My head is heavy! My arm is heavy!" - and if it speaks thus regarding the [suffering] wicked, all the more so regarding the righteous [who suffer]. And you shall not defile your land - that is one rationale, that is to say: therefore do not leave the corpse [hanging], for a dead person defiles whatever touches it or is in a tent beneath it, and those that carry pure [food] for pure people would be defiled.

(R. Yosef Bekhor Shor ad loc)

 

If, along the road, you chance upon a bird's nest, in any tree or on the ground, with fledglings or eggs and the mother sitting over the fledglings or on the eggs, do not take the mother together with her young, send, yes, send away the mother, and take the offspring for yourself, in order that you may fare well and have a long life.

(Devarim 22:6-7)

 

Anticipation of Reward: Incentive or Obstacle?

There are mitzvot that are rewarded with wealth, and there are mitzvot that are rewarded with honor; what is the reward for this mitzvah? If you have no children, I will give you children. From where do we know this? It is written, Send, yes, send away the mother - and what is the reward you reap? And take the offspring for yourself.

(Devarim Rabba, 6)

 

Aher [Elisha ben Abuya] saw a person climb to the top of a palm tree on Shabbat, take the mother together with the fledglings, and climb down safely. Immediately following the Shabbat, he saw one climb to the top of a palm, take the fledgling, send away the mother, descend, be bitten by a snake, and die. He said: it is written (Devarim 22) Send, yes, send away the mother and take the offspring for yourself, so that you may fare well and have a long life. Where is the welfare of this person? Where is his long life? He was unaware that Rabbi Akiva had expounded So that you fare well - in that world of total good; and have a long life - in that long-lasting world. (Kohellet Rabba 7)

When you build a new house, you are to make a parapet for your roof, that you not put blood guilt on your house if someone falling falls from it.

(Devarim 22:8)

 

Is Everything in God's Hands?

If someone falling falls from it - this person deserved to fall, but even so let his death not be caused by you, because merit is awarded through the meritorious and retribution through the guilty. (Rashi, Devarim 22:8)

 

Animals and souls, constellations and spheres and angels, all are in God's hands (RaMBaM's Epistle to the Proselyte), that is to say, all of the natural order. The conclusion, therefore, is that davka because "everything is in God's hands", i.e., because the laws of nature are immutable, one must erect a parapet, thereby preventing gravitation from causing that man to fall and be smashed.

(Y. Leibowitz, Sheva Shanim shel Sihot al Parashat HaShavua pg. 867)

 

Then guard yourself against anything bad (Devarim 23:10): Moral Behavior in the Moment of Truth

When you go forth in camp (Devarim 23:10) Even when you have left your homes and the restricting influence of ordinary family and social life and find yourself in a military camp set out for war against an enemy (the Sifri stresses the words against your enemy, the Torah assumes that you will only wage war against enemies who have proven themselves to be such, from whose enmity you have suffered and whose further actions you must expect, against whose attack you have to protect your land and your families; (this excludes any aggressive war of conquest) - so that even when you are in a military camp where the ordinary restrictions of morality and decency become so easily loosened, and the purpose of the war itself could tend to foster unrestrained coarseness and brutality, then guard yourself against anything bad, you are not to loose your self-controlling inner inspection and keep yourself on guard against anything bad.

(Rabbi S.R. Hirsch on Devarim 23:10, Levy translation)

 

When you reap your harvest in your field and forget a sheaf in the field: an Unintentional Commandment

It happened that a certain pious man forgot a sheave in his field and he told his son: "Go and sacrifice for me a bull as a burnt offering and a bull for a peace offering."

He asked him: "Father, why did you see fit to rejoice more in the fulfillment of this commandment than of all the other commandments in the Torah?"

He told him: "The Omnipresent gave them all the other commandments of the Torah to perform intentionally; but this one is performed unintentionally, for if we had acted willingly before the Omnipresent, we would not have an opportunity to perform this commandment. Rather, it says, when you reap, etc. and Scripture established a blessing [in reward] for its performance. This is a kal vahomer! If someone did not intend to perform the commandment yet performed it is considered as if he performed it, all the more so someone who intended to perform it and did perform it!

(Tosefta Pe'ah 3:14)

 

Midrashei Tzafon - From the pen of our member, Ronen Ahituv

 

And the Lord your God shall turn the curse into a blessing (23:6).

Someone could say: Every curse [will be transformed] into a blessing, but the verse teaches us: and guard yourself from all evil (verse 10). Balaam's words changed into a blessing, an evil word which you speak shall be turned against you, for it is said: He should not see anything unseemly among you and would turn away from you (verse 15). And it says, Keep that which is emitted from your lips (verse 24), that that which is emitted from your lips is kept for you. Go and learn from Balaam; he cursed and the Omnipresent changed his curse into a blessing for Israel, and again it was changed into a curse for Moab, for it is said: You shall not ever seek out their welfare or their good (verse 7).

The attitude towards Balaam's curse seems strange. If, in any event, he ended up blessing Israel, why should he and Moab be punished? And in general: If a curse in ineffective, what is evil about a curse?

The drasha claims that a curse has two consequences: it can sometimes bless the target of the curse while cursing the curser. Linguistic hygiene is the rationale for opposition to curses, and therefore the drasha tells us that the curser pollutes himself with a kind of ervat davar -"unseemly thing" (that is to say, ervat dibbur, "unseemly speech"). The notion that the curse harms the curser is connected to the verse, Keep that which is emitted from your lips. The plain meaning of that verse concerns vows rather than curses, but it is possible to link vows and curses, since they both hold responsible the one who utters them.

 

 

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