Chapter 1
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| RABBAN GAMLIEL SAID: PROVIDE YOURSELF WITH A TEACHER, AND REMOVE YOURSELF FROM DOUBTS, AND DO NOT ACCUSTOM YOURSELF TO TITHE BY ESTIMATION. |
He was known as Rabban Gamliel HaZaken, (the Elder), and was the grandson of Hillel. He lived at the beginning of the Common Era. As the President of the Sanhedrin he was the first to bear the superior title of Rabban "our Master." Rabbi Joseph Hertz, in his commentary on the ETHICS writes, "Many beneficent regulations are ascribed to him. Among them, the regulation to visit and heal the heathen sick, to bury the friendless dead of heathens, and support their indigent poor in the same way as was done in regard to the Jewish poor, sick and dead. He also laid down the principle... One must not impose upon the public a restriction which the majority cannot endure."
This is the first time the title Rabban is applied to the head of the Sanhedrin. It also marks the transition from the period of the Zugos, pairs... those pairs of teachers who preceded Rabban Gamliel and whose teachings were quoted in all the previous Mishnas, to the period of the Tanaaim. The latter were those who clarified the Mishna, collected, edited and refined the Mishna, culminating with the redaction of the Mishna by Rebbe Yehuda Hanasi, (the Prince) about 150 years later.
It is interesting to observe that until Rabban Gamliel Hazaken, no titles were applied to the scholars, just their names. In rabbinic lore the use of a person's name, untitled, signifies the greatness of the personality; the greater the man, the less need for a title.
Until the 1st century before the Common Era, there was relative tranquility within Judea, and central Torah authority. The Zugos were the recognized authorities as the Nasi, President of the Sanhedrin and the Av Beis Din, chief of the Court of Law, respectively. As a result of Rome's involvement in the internal affairs of the Jews, Judea suffered a decline in the political and social conditions, which had its impact on the spiritual life of its people. Scholarship suffered, and the need to reestablish supremacy of Torah scholarship and precision became a pressing matter.
The Mesorah, that Oral transmission of Torah from one generation to another, is emphasized by the words of the prior Mishnas of chapter 1, Mishna 1 through Mishna 16. Invariably the earlier mishnas read "[this scholar]... received the mesorah from... [his predecessor]". From Mishna 16 forward we do not find that phraseology at all, because in increasing number of cases the transmission was less a straightforward, clear, uniform transmission. Conditions created doubts, possible inaccuracies, which required greater and more intensive study in order to reconstruct the thread of the Halacha to its source, from Sinai.
The Talmud states that while Hillel and Shammai, the last of the Zugos, rarely disagreed with each other, in the case of their disciples, however... "when the disciples of Hillel and Shammai increased, Torah began to resemble two Torahs. During their lifetime (Hillel and Shammai) they did not dispute. But among their disciples, dispute did not cease."
Therefore, Rabban Gamliel, a contemporary of that period, and as the Nasi, uttered words that were most pertinent to his times....
We may understand that advice in three ways:
1.Make YOURSELF a teacher... The demand for scholarship is all the greater in times of stress. Improve your knowledge of Torah, insure the continuity and the accuracy of Torah by more diligent study. Torah is not inherited; it must be transmitted... and it must be transmitted truthfully, without doubts.
2.Provide yourself a teacher... When you are in doubt approach someone who is greater than you, and do not be ashamed to inquire in order to remove your doubts.
3.Provide yourself a teacher... when you are in doubt approach another who may even not be as knowledgeable as you (Rabeinu Yona). Nobody is the repository of all wisdom and knowledge and even a lesser person may illumine and disperse the doubt a greater man experiences, and give him insights he did not see before.
All of the above have one purpose... to establish truth! The demand Torah makes upon every individual is to be true.
If a man has doubts in his mind, then fudges his lack of clarity and transmits it to another under the guise of authority, cloaks it in catch phrases that beguile... that man is a liar! If one claims to be a teacher, then how much greater is his crime of deception when he deceives his listeners and transmits lies to people who do not know how to parry those arguments!
Over and over again we are impressed with the lesson that the Torah is a Toras Emes, a Torah of Truth and that G-d's seal is Emes... Truth.
So from where do these perversions come? They stem from a lack of thorough knowledge and understanding of Torah, and consequently an ego attempt to rationalize the apparently implausible. They stem from a deficiency in appreciating the dedication of the Torah Scholars of Israel to Truth, and ipso facto ascribe to them motives of deception. They stem from those who fail to remember the ramifications of a basic principle, that should one letter of the Torah be distorted, that Torah is not a True Torah...and is invalid to transmit the Word of Hashem to Israel, until it is perfected. These perversions come from those who forget that the verse in Proverbs 21:30... "There is no knowledge, and no understanding, and no idea [that takes precedence] before Hashem"... has always meant that even a commoner must stand up to authority when that authority abuses, perverts, distorts Torah. The perversions stem from those who ignore the basic premise of Torah... TRUTH!
When one hears statements like "Purim is a fairy tale", or "G-d is limited", one is impelled to ask... have the authors of those statements ever given thought to the incongruity of their remarks with basic Torah principles of the demand for truth? Are they saying then that our Torah teachers, scholars and schools are perpetrating and perpetuating lies in defiance of Torah command?
Are they saying that Jews are a bunch of idiots who will accept a fairy tale at a given moment in history...without challenge? If, as they propose, that Purim never happened, but that this fairy tale was created and was foisted upon a given generation by their teachers saying that it did happen, let us ask... why didn't that whole generation of Jews react vehemently by saying... "WAIT A MINUTE! ....HOW COME YOU, THE TEACHERS KNOW ABOUT IT, AND NOBODY ELSE KNOWS ABOUT IT?....NONE OF OUR FATHERS EVER TOLD US ABOUT PURIM! WHY?"
They didn't react vehemently because it wasn't a hoax. Purim is an historical event that occurred within 30 years after the restoration of the Second Commonwealth and Purim acquired such great significance because Jews lived under the domain of the Persian Empire which was the dominant power in the world. Purim, then had all the ingredients for universal acknowledgement.
It is ironic that these revisionists of Jewish history will readily accept the imprecise inferences to the past from non-Jewish, often Jewishly hostile sources, and/or their own rationale, and malign the words of our own scholars.
The doubts they harbor in their minds they attempt to transmit to other Jews. Therein lies the tragedy of our people. Imprecise knowledge breeds lack of clarity, doubts, misunderstandings, misinterpretations, rationalizations, defenses... and a new train of 'authoritative' thinking that often leads away from the simple understanding of what is or was... which is the truth of the event or the message.
Rabbon Gamliel, the Elder, understood the tribulations of his generation. The encounter with Rome left its wound on the Jewish body politic and the Jewish soul, as the Galus, diaspora, has left its strokes upon the Jewish nation for 2000 years. His admonition for each to provide a teacher for himself, to look back to one's forbearers for guidance so as to help resolve the doubts that arise in life, are the prerequisites for all of us before we attempt to transmit our heritage truthfully to our descendants.