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PIRKE AVOT |
Sayings of the Jewish FathersIntroduction Pirkei Avoth (Hebrew: Chapters of the Fathers, פרקי אבות ) or simply Avoth is a tractate of the Mishna composed of ethical maxims of the Rabbis of the Mishnaic period. It is the second-last tractate in the Mishnaic order Nezikin. The tractate consists of five chapters. The first four chapters contain sayings attributed to sages from Simon the Just (3rd century B.C.E.) to Judah haNasi (3rd century C.E.), redactor of the Mishnah. These aphorisms concern proper ethical and social conduct, as well as the importance of Torah study. The fifth chapter of Avoth departs from the organization and content of the preceding four in that it consists mostly of anonymous sayings structured around numerical lists, several of which have no direct connection with ethics. The last four paragraphs return to the format of moral aphorisms attributed to specific rabbis. In liturgical use, and in most printed editions of Avoth, a sixth chapter, Kinyan Torah ("Acquisition of Torah") is added; this is in fact the second chapter of tractate Kallah, one of the minor tractates. It is added because its content and style closely approximate that of the original tractate Avoth. From at least the time of Saadia Gaon (10th century C.E.), it has been customary to study one chapter a week on each of the seven Sabbaths between Passover and Shavuot, or nowadays until Rosh Hashana; the tractate is therefore included in many prayer books, following the Sabbath afternoon prayers. In the course of such study, it is common to preface each chapter with the Mishnaic saying, "All Israel has a share in the world to come" (Sanhedrin 10:1), and to conclude each chapter with the saying, "The Holy One, blessed be He, wished to bestow merit upon Israel; therefore he gave them Torah and mitzvot in abundance" (Makkoth 3:16). The tractate includes several of the most frequently-quoted rabbinic sayings, such as "If I am not for myself, who will be for me? If I am [only] for myself, what am I? And if not now, when?" (Avoth 1:15), and "It is not up to you to complete the work, but neither are you free to desist from it" (Avoth 2:19). Although Avoth does not have an accompanying Gemara, one of the minor tractates of the Talmud, Avoth deRabbi Nathan ("The Fathers according to Rabbi Nathan"), is an expansion of the Mishnaic tractate containing numerous additional ethical teachings and legends.
The Tractate Abot ( Massechet Abot ) is the ninth treatise of The Order or Series on Damages ( Seder Nezikin ), which is the fourth section of the Mishnah (1). It is commonly known in Hebrew as Pirke Abot , The Chapters of the Fathers , and has also been termed Mishnat ha-Chasidim , Instruction for the Pious , because of the Rabbinic saying, "He who wishes to be pious, let him practise the teachings of Abot " (2). On account of the nature of its contents, it is generally designated in English as the Ethics of the Fathers . Taylor entitles his edition Dibre Aboth ha-Olam , Sayings of the Fathers of the World , and has as the English title, Sayings of the Jewish Fathers . Gustav Gottheil refers to the Abot as the Sayings of the Pharisaic Fathers (3). Its German title is generally Die Spruche der Vater , and in French it is usually rendered Chapitres or Maximes des Peres . (1) See infra , [Chapter V], n. 61. (2) Baba Kamma , 30a. See Taylor, Sayings of the Jewish Fathers , p. 3. Maimonides refers to this saying in the Foreword of his Eight Chapters ; see Gorfinkle, The Eight Chapters , etc., p. 34. (3) See Sun and Shield , p. 321 et passim . See infra , n. 8, which accounts for the use of " Pharisaic ." The use of the word Abot (fathers), in the title, is of very ancient date. We can only guess at the reason for its being used, and, consequently, there are various explanations for it. Samuel de Uceda, in his collective commentary, says that as this tractate of the Mishnah contains the advice and good counsel, which, for the most part, come from a father, the Rabbis mentioned in it adopt the role of "fathers," and are therefore so designated. This explanation does not, however, deter him from advancing another to the effect that this treatise is the basis of all subsequent ethical and moral teachings and doctrines, and the Rabbis are, in consequence, the "fathers" or prototypes of all ethical teachers and moralists (4). Loeb attributes its use to the fact that the Rabbis of Abot are the "fathers" or "ancestors of Rabbinic Judaism" (5). Hoffman states that the word abot means "teachers of tradition" ( Traditionslehrer ), and points to the expression abot ha-olam ( Eduyot , I. 4), which, translated literally, is "fathers of the world," but is used to designate the most distinguished teachers, which is a true characterization of the Rabbis of Abot (6). Taylor says in regard to the title, "It takes its name from the fact that it consists to a great extent of the maxims of the Jewish Fathers whose names are mentioned in the pages" (7). Hoffmann's seems the most acceptable explanation. (4) Midrash Shemuel (ed. Warsaw, 1876), p. 6. The Midrash Shemuel is a collective commentary, first published in Venice in 1579, and which has since passed through six editions. See p. 22, n. 21. (5) La Chaine , etc., p. 307, n. 1. (6) See Hoffman, Seder Nesikin, Introd. , p. xx, and p. 258, n. 36. In this passage of Eduyot , Hillel and Shammai are referred to as abot ha-olam ; in Yerushalmi Shekalim , III, 47b, Rabbi and Ishmael and Rabbi Akiba, and in Yerushalmi Chagigah , II, 77d, all the pairs of Abot I are similarly designated. (7) Taylor, loc. cit. Purpose The original aim of Abot was to show the divine source and authority of the traditional law revealed to Moses on Mt. Sinai, and to demonstrate its continuity from Moses through Joshua, the elders, and the men of the Great Synagogue, down to those Rabbis who lived during the period between 200 B.C.E. to 200 C.E. Loeb maintains that Abot was originally a composition of the Pharisaic Rabbis who wished to indicate that the traditions held and expounded by them, and which the Sadducees repudiated, were divine and, in time and sequence, uninterruptedly authoritative (8). This line of continuous tradition is plainly seen in the first two chapters. A second and probably later purpose was to present a body of practical maxims and aphorisms for the daily guidance of the people. (8) La Chaine , etc. The Sadducees belonged to the priestly and aristocratic families. They made light of the oral traditions, did not believe in the future life, and were indifferent to the independence of the Jewish nation. The Pharisees, on the other hand, were constituted largely from the common people; they were believers in, and strict observers of, the traditional laws, and were ardent nationalists. The bitter attack of Jesus on them, which has resulted in making the word "Pharisee" synonymous with "hypocrite" and "self-righteous person," was, to say the least, unjust, as Herford has so lucidly pointed out in his sympathetic study of the Pharisees. Herford, though not a Jew, has taken up the cudgels most ably in defence of this sect, with remarkable insight into the life and literature of the ancient Jews. He demonstrates conclusively that though there were hypocrites among the Pharisees, as among all classes and creeds, yet the average Pharisee was a man of the most elevated religious ideals, who misunderstood Jesus, but who, in turn was misunderstood by him. Huxley, in his Evolution of Theology , says, "of all the strange ironies in history, perhaps the strangest is that 'Pharisee' is current as a term of reproach among the theological descendants of that sect of Nazarenes who, without the martyr spirit of those primitive Puritans, would never have come into existence." Such great teachers and men of sterling quality and golden utterance as Antigonus of Soko (I, 3), Hillel (I, 12-14; II, 5-8), Jochanan ben Zakkai (II, 9-19), Gamaliel, whose pupil was Paul, the apostle (I, 16), and Judah, the Prince (II, 1), whose sayings grace the pages of Abot , were, as Loeb points out, of the Pharisaic school or party. There is naturally a large literature on the Pharisees. Herford's Pharisaism deserves careful perusal. See, also, Josephus (ed. Whiston-Margoliouth), Antiq. , XIII, 10.6, XVIII, 1, 2-4; Schurer, History of the Jews , etc., II, ii, p. 14 et seq. ; Jewish Encyclopedia and literature mentioned there; Geiger, Judaism and Its History , p. 102 et seq. , and Friedlander, G., The Jewish Sources of the Sermon on the Mount , p. 34 et seq. Description The Sayings of the Jewish Fathers is the oldest collection of ethical dicta of the Rabbis of the Mishnah (9). It is a Rabbinic anthology. It has been happily styled "a compendium of practical ethics" (10), and, as Mielziner has said, "these Rabbinical sentences, if properly arranged, present an almost complete code of human duties" (11). The Abot is, then, a sort of moral code. (9) There was another, and apparently older, recension of Pirke Abot on which is based the Abot de-Rabbi Natan , an hagadic or homiletical exposition of Abot . Two recensions of Abot de-Rabbi Natan exist, and have been edited by Schechter. On this work, see Hoffman, Die erste Mischna , p. 26 et seq. , Mielziner, article Abot de-Rabbi Natan , in Jewish Encyclopedia , Strack, Einleitung , p. 69 et seq., and Pollak, Rabbi Nathans System , etc., Introduction , pp. 7-9. An English translation is found in Rodkinson's edition of the Talmud , vol. V, p. 1 et seq. (10) Taylor, loc. cit. Lazarus, Ethics of Judaism , II. 113, calls it "a compendium of ethics." (11) In Jewish Encyclopedia , art. Abot .
Translated, with an Introduction and Notes by Author of Second Edition
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