A Special Pesach/Pirkei Avot D'var Torah

So, for the past half a year, I've been posting every week about the weekly Torah portion. This week is a little different. Because this Shabbat falls during Pesach, the weekly cycle of Torah reading gets put on pause. For that reason, I chose to write this week's D'var Torah on a different topic. During the six weeks between the end of Pesach and Shavuot, it is customary to study Pirkei Avot, one chapter a week, every Shabbat. In the Ashkenazi world, this study takes place at Mincha, but the Sepharadim study right in the middle of the morning services. I had been exposed to quotes from Pirkei Avot growing up, with such highlights as Hillel's tripartite maxim: "If I am not for myself, who would be for me? If I am only for myself, what am I? And if not now, when?" But until a few years ago, I had never really explored the actual text, even though it is pretty short, so I had only a superficial understanding of what it actually was.

Pirkei Avot is a compendium of maxims expounded by the great rabbis of the Mishnah (the first five chapters make up a tractate of Mishnah called Avot, and the sixth chapter is an excerpt dealing with learning Torah, taken from the minor tractate Kallah). Unlike most of the rest of the Mishnah, Avot is not a legal text, and for that reason, there is no Gemara on it (and no indication as to why it is included in the order concerned with judicial procedure). Nevertheless, after studying it more, it has become one of my favorite parts of the Jewish bookshelf because it is both short and is easily accessible to inexperienced readers while also providing material for the more experienced.

The name "Pirkei Avot" is commonly translated as "Ethics of the Fathers," even though "perek" (the singular and non-possessive form of "pirkei") means "chapter" and nothing to do with ethics. That said, the teachings contained within Pirkei Avot are generally ethical proverbs, so it is understandable that translators chose to use that wording. The real misnomer in the conventional translation is with the word "fathers". It is true that it is a literal translation of "Avot", but the great sages are never called "fathers" in rabbinic Hebrew. That term, when it refers to people, is only ever used for the biblical Patriarchs. In the legal Hebrew of the Mishnah, however, "avot" has another meaning, that of "basic categories". The 39 categories of prohibited labor on Shabbat are "Avot Melacha", and the basic sources of ritual impurity are "Avot Tum‘ah", and the specifications derived from the Avot are called "toledot" - "offspring" of the avot. So, what "Pirkei Avot" really means is probably something like "Foundational Principles [of Ethics]" and not a reference to the sources of the wisdom imparted therin.

One of my favorite maxims, which I think encapsulates the spirit of Pirkei Avot as a work, is the start of 3:17. In it, Rabbi Elazar ben Azariah teaches, "If there is no Torah, there is no common decency; if there is no common decency, there is no Torah. If there is no wisdom, there is no fear of God; if there is no fear of God, there is no wisdom. If there is no understanding, there is no knowledge; if there is no knowledge, there is no understanding. If there is no flour, there is no Torah; if there is no Torah, there is no flour." Everything is necessary, it just needs to be in the correct balance. If we lack one aspect of life, then the rest cannot be properly fulfilled. The last juxtaposition, about flour (which is used as a metonym for bread, itself a metonym for life supported by bread) is a great description of how, as much as Torah learning ought to be an integral part of Jewish life, if everyone only studied all day, there would be nobody left to keep the nation going. The scholars maintain the workers and vice versa. Without one, the other is irrelevant. This sentiment, that religious study ought to exist in harmony with secular knowledge,
appears several times in different chapters, and the frequency of repetition just proves how important it is to remember.

Chag sameach and Shabbat shalom. Our progression through the Torah will resume next week with Shmini.

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