[Avodah] The 93 Beit Yaakov Martyrs: A Modern Midrash

[Micha Berger via Avodah]

On Tue, Jul 25, 2017 at 05:11:46PM -0400, Zev Sero via Areivim wrote:
: On 25/07/17 16:48, Allan Engel wrote:
: >That would be obvious and would hardly need saying, as many
: >midrashim contradict each other.
: 
: And that is all the Rambam is saying.  He's *not* making some bold
: statement against medroshim-as-history.  He's defining who's an
: apikores, and including those who reject midroshim, so he has to
: specify that this doesn't mean one must make ones head explode by
: accepting every single medrosh as literally true.   Some are
: literally true, some aren't, and one must use ones best judgment
: about which is which.
: 
: This implies that on many specific medroshim there will be
: legitimate differences of opinion, and therefore one can't dismiss
: someone as an apikores merely because he holds a specific medrosh to
: be non-literal; one must inquire further and find out *why* he holds
: so, because he might have a legitimate reason.

I think you misrepresent the Rambam. The original is here
<http://www.daat.ac.il/daat/mahshevt/rambam/hakdamat-2.htm#3> (scrolled
to the right place in the intro to Cheileq), but given that the list
STILL can't do Hebrew, here's a translation from Merkaz Moreshet haRambam
<https://www.mhcny.org/qt/1005.pdf> (paragraphing theirs). I do not know
how you can read the following and conclude anything but his insistence
that midrashic stories are NOT history, and that
1- people who think otherwise and therefore believe nimna'os are
aniyei daas, yeish lehitzta'er aleihem lesikhlusam;
2- people who think these stories are meant to be historical, realize
they can't be, and yi'agu al divrei chakhamim; and
3- the wise few know that all they say about devarim hanimna'im were
said bederekh chidah umashal.

I see nothing at all there about machloqes, only about learning nimshalim
and not taking impossible meshalim as historical fact.

Here is the section in full:

    You must know that the words of the sages are differently interpreted
    by three groups of people.

    The first group is the largest one. I have observed them read their books,
    and heard about them. They accept the teachings of the sages in their
    simple literal sense and do not think that these teachings contain any
    hidden meaning at all. They believe that all sorts of impossible things
    must be. They hold such opinions because they have not understood science
    and are far from having acquired knowledge. They possess no perfection
    which would rouse them to insight from within, nor have they found anyone
    else to stimulate them to profounder understanding. They, therefore,
    believe that the sages intended no more in their carefully emphatic and
    straightforward utterances than they themselves are able to understand
    with inadequate knowledge. They understand the teachings of the sages
    only in their literal sense, in spite of the fact that some of their
    teachings when taken literally, seem so fantastic and irrational that
    if one were to repeat them literally, even to the uneducated, let alone
    sophisticated scholars, their amazement would prompt them to ask how
    anyone in the world could believe such things true, much less edifying.

    The members of this group are poor in knowledge. One can only regret their
    folly. Their very effort to honor and to exalt the sage sin accordance
    with their own meager understanding actually humiliates them. As God
    lives, this group destroys the glory of the Torah of God say the opposite
    of what it intended. For He said in His perfect Torah, "The nation is a
    wise and understanding people" (Deut. 4:6). But this group expounds the
    laws and the teachings of our sages in such a way that when the other
    peoples hear them they say that this little people is foolish and ignoble.

    The worst offenders are preachers who preach and expound to the masses
    what they themselves do not understand. Would that they keep silent about
    what they do not know, as it is written: "If only they would be utterly
    silent, it would be accounted to them as wisdom" (Job 13:5). Or they
    might at least say, "We do not understand what our sages intended in this
    statement, and we do not know how to explain it." But they believe they
    do understand, and they vigorously expound to the people what they think
    rather than what the sages really said. They, therefore, give lectures to
    the people on the tractate Berakhot and on this present chapter, and other
    texts, expounding them word-for-word according to their literal meaning.

    The second group is also a numerous one. It, too, consist of persons who,
    having read or heard the words of the sages, understand them according
    to their simple literal sense and believe that the sages, understand
    them according to their simple literal sense and believe that the sages
    intended nothing else than what may be learned from their literal
    interpretation. Inevitably, they ultimately declare the sages to be
    fools, hold them up to contempt, and slander what does not deserve to
    be slandered. They imagine that their own intelligence is of a higher
    order than that of the sages, and that the sages were simpletons who
    suffered from inferior intelligence. The members of this group are so
    pretentiously stupid that they can never attain genuine wisdom. Most of
    these who have stumbled into this error are involved with medicine or
    astrology. They regard themselves as cultivated men, scientist, critics,
    and philosophers. How remote they are from true humanity compared to
    real philosophers! They are more stupid than the first group; many of
    them are simply fools.

    This is an accursed group, because they attempt to refute men of
    established greatness whose wisdom has been demonstrated to competent
    men of science. If these fools had worked at science hard enough to know
    how to write accurately about theology and similar subjects both for
    the masses and for the educated, and if they understood the relevance of
    philosophy, then they would be in a position to understand whether the
    sages were in fact wise or not, and the real meaning of their teachings
    would be clear to them.

    There is a third group. Its members are so few in number that it is
    hardly appropriate to call them a group, except in the sense in which
    one speaks of the sun as a group (or species) of which it is the only
    member. This group consists of men whom the greatness of our sages is
    clear. They recognize the superiority of their intelligence from their
    words which point to exceedingly profound truths. Even though this
    third group is few and scattered, their books teach the perfection
    which was achieved by the authors and the high level of truth which
    they had attained. The members of this group understand that the sages
    knew as clearly as we do the difference between the impossibility of
    the impossible and the existence of that which must exist. They know
    that the sages did not speak nonsense, and it is clear to them that the
    words of the sages contain both an obvious and a hidden meaning. Thus,
    whenever the sages spoke of things that seem impossible, they were
    employing the style of riddle and parable which is the method of truly
    great thinkers. For example, the greatest of our wise men (Solomon)
    began his book by saying: "To understand an analogy and a metaphor,
    the words of the wise and their riddles" (Prov. 1:6).

    All students of rhetoric know the real concern of a riddle is with its
    hidden meaning and not with its obvious meaning, as: "Let me now put forth
    a riddle to you" (Judges 14:12). Since the words of the sages all deal
    with supernatural matters which are ultimate, they must be expressed in
    riddles and analogies. How can we complain if they formulate their wisdom
    in analogies and employ such figures of speech as are easily understood
    by the masses, especially when we note that the wisest of all men did
    precisely that, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit? I have in mind
    Solomon in Proverbs, the Song of Songs, and parts of Ecclesiastes.

    It is often difficult for us to interpret words and to educe their true
    meaning from the form in which they are contained so that their real
    inner meaning conforms to reason and corresponds with truth. This is
    the case even with Holy Scriptures. The sages themselves interpreted
    Scriptural passages in such a way as to educe their inner meaning from
    literal sense, correctly considering these passages to be figures of
    speech, just as we do. Examples are their explanations of the following
    passages: "he smote the two altar-hearths of Moab; he went down also and
    slew a lion in the midst of a pit" (II Sam. 23:20); "Oh, that one would
    give me water to drink of the well of Bethlehem" (ibid. 23:15). The
    entire narrative of which these passages are a part was interpreted
    metaphorically. Similarly, the whole Book of Job was considered by many
    of the sages to be properly understood only in metaphoric terms. The
    dead bones of Ezekiel (Ezek. 37) were also considered by one of the
    rabbis to make sense only in metamorphic terms. Similar treatment was
    given to other passages of this sort.

    Now if you, reader, belong to either of the first two groups, pay no
    attention to my words nor to anything else in this section. You will not
    like it. On the contrary, it will irritate you, and you will hate it. How
    could a person who is accustomed to eating large amounts of harmful
    food find simple food in small quantities appealing, even though they
    are good for him? On the contrary, he will actually find them irritating
    and he will hate them. Do you not recall the reaction of the people who
    were accustomed to eating onions, garlic, fish, and the like? They said:
    "Now our soul is dried away; there is nothing at all; we have naught
    save this manna to look to" (Num. 11:6).

    But if you belong to the third group, when you encounter a word of the
    sages which seems to conflict with reason, you will pause, consider it,
    and realize that this utterance must be a riddle or a parable. You will
    sleep on it, trying anxiously to grasp its logic and its expression, so
    that you may find its genuine intellectual intention and lay hold of a
    direct faith, as Scripture says: "To find out words of delight, and that
    which was written uprightly, even words of truth" (Eccles. 12:10). If
    you consider my book in this spirit, with the help of God, it may be
    useful to you.


-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             Zion will be redeemed through justice,
micha at aishdas.org        and her returnees, through righteousness.
http://www.aishdas.org
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