1 00:00:06,640 --> 00:00:10,480 Welcome to Judaism Demystified, a podcast for the Perplexed. 2 00:00:11,360 --> 00:00:13,760 We are joined again by Professor Jeffrey Rubenstein. 3 00:00:14,280 --> 00:00:18,280 Many of you have emailed us and written to us asking us to get 4 00:00:18,280 --> 00:00:20,920 him back on. I believe he was on episode 9 5 00:00:20,920 --> 00:00:27,080 and he had a very, very interesting she or about Agadan 6 00:00:27,080 --> 00:00:30,440 Midrash, but we didn't give it actual examples. 7 00:00:30,440 --> 00:00:34,720 It's kind of touched on certain ideas and we decided that we 8 00:00:34,720 --> 00:00:39,680 should probably have an episode or two or three getting into the 9 00:00:39,680 --> 00:00:42,360 nitty gritty of some of these agadot. 10 00:00:42,840 --> 00:00:46,800 And we decided that one of the parts that we should focus on 11 00:00:46,880 --> 00:00:50,840 from his book Talmudic stories was the character of Aker, 12 00:00:50,840 --> 00:00:53,120 Alicia Benabuya. So we're going to be doing a 13 00:00:53,120 --> 00:00:56,080 three-part series, something we haven't done before, just on 14 00:00:56,080 --> 00:00:59,000 this character. The different versions of the 15 00:00:59,000 --> 00:01:06,320 story which appear in the Tosefta, the to Talmud Yashami 16 00:01:06,320 --> 00:01:10,760 and the Talmud Bhavli. And this podcast was also 17 00:01:11,000 --> 00:01:14,000 recorded over the span of a year, all three episodes. 18 00:01:14,000 --> 00:01:16,280 We had to spread it out. So you might hear some 19 00:01:16,280 --> 00:01:19,200 references that were, you know, talking about personal anecdotes 20 00:01:19,520 --> 00:01:23,280 that may seem a little out of place, but I'm sure if you 21 00:01:23,680 --> 00:01:26,760 understand in that context, you will be prepared for that. 22 00:01:27,240 --> 00:01:31,080 And also, I want to say that this episode is dedicated to the 23 00:01:31,320 --> 00:01:36,040 the neshama of Mayor Ben Moshe. I love a Shalom Abdul Rahim 24 00:01:36,040 --> 00:01:38,440 Ilion, the late father of our dear friend Rod Ilion. 25 00:01:38,960 --> 00:01:42,480 So without further ado, Professor Rubenstein. 26 00:01:50,320 --> 00:01:52,640 Thank you, Professor Rubenstein, for joining the Judaism 27 00:01:52,640 --> 00:01:54,800 Demystified podcast. This is the first time, 28 00:01:54,800 --> 00:01:57,360 actually, that Bensee and I are filming separately. 29 00:01:57,680 --> 00:02:01,040 He is in his hotel room traveling, and we just didn't 30 00:02:01,040 --> 00:02:03,680 want to miss this opportunity to speak to you again. 31 00:02:03,840 --> 00:02:05,680 We've gotten such great feedback. 32 00:02:06,480 --> 00:02:10,520 Bensee can, you know, tell you more about our feedback from the 33 00:02:10,520 --> 00:02:14,040 first episode? So fancy, Why don't you address 34 00:02:14,240 --> 00:02:18,280 the professor? So we got tremendous feedback 35 00:02:18,280 --> 00:02:23,120 and people loved everything that we were saying about Agada. 36 00:02:24,080 --> 00:02:27,680 The only thing that I felt was missing and and that people 37 00:02:27,680 --> 00:02:30,720 might have felt was missing is to actually go through it in 38 00:02:30,720 --> 00:02:35,440 detail inside and see it. Whereas our first podcast was 39 00:02:35,440 --> 00:02:40,000 more general, this podcast, which is really like the first 40 00:02:40,000 --> 00:02:43,600 podcast that we did with you, it's really to get to this point 41 00:02:43,800 --> 00:02:47,920 where we actually take the ideas that we generalized in the first 42 00:02:47,920 --> 00:02:51,760 podcast and bring it into, you know, fruition now. 43 00:02:51,760 --> 00:02:55,640 And to really go through an Agada the proper way, the 44 00:02:55,640 --> 00:02:59,520 structure to analyze it, to break it down to, you know, 45 00:02:59,560 --> 00:03:02,480 everything that the professor will be doing for us today. 46 00:03:02,480 --> 00:03:04,880 And we're really appreciative of it because this is going to be 47 00:03:04,880 --> 00:03:07,240 fantastic. OK. 48 00:03:07,240 --> 00:03:10,200 Well, thank you for having me and I'm delighted to be on the 49 00:03:10,760 --> 00:03:15,480 the podcast or YouTube again. So yeah, we we will be dealing 50 00:03:15,480 --> 00:03:17,440 with the Agadav, Alicia Benabuya. 51 00:03:17,520 --> 00:03:21,360 That was what Ben and Benji asked me to discuss, which I've 52 00:03:21,360 --> 00:03:24,520 written about in my book Told Munich Stories and and 53 00:03:24,520 --> 00:03:27,160 elsewhere. And of course, Alicia Benabuya. 54 00:03:27,280 --> 00:03:31,280 And the story of Alicia Benabuya is one of the most interesting, 55 00:03:31,280 --> 00:03:33,720 one of the most problematic in some ways. 56 00:03:34,000 --> 00:03:38,160 One of the most popular. Stories about the rabbis, at 57 00:03:38,160 --> 00:03:41,480 least in in modern times. It's also a very challenging one 58 00:03:41,480 --> 00:03:46,000 to start with because it's complicated, it's long and it's 59 00:03:46,000 --> 00:03:49,440 got various different and contradictory tendencies within 60 00:03:49,440 --> 00:03:50,800 it. But it's always good to start 61 00:03:50,800 --> 00:03:54,680 high, and we can always do other podcasts about more 62 00:03:54,680 --> 00:03:57,360 straightforward or simple stories. 63 00:03:57,400 --> 00:04:01,080 I've got dope. So Alicia, as I mentioned and 64 00:04:01,080 --> 00:04:04,720 I'm sure everybody knows, it's become increasingly very, very 65 00:04:04,720 --> 00:04:09,480 popular today and part of this is due to Milton Steinberg's As 66 00:04:09,480 --> 00:04:14,240 a Driven Leaf, which is a modern reconstruction or retelling or a 67 00:04:14,240 --> 00:04:17,880 full length book of Alicia Benabuya and his life. 68 00:04:17,880 --> 00:04:21,000 I mean it's fictional but based on the comedic stories. 69 00:04:21,000 --> 00:04:24,120 But many people have have read this book and enjoyed it and 70 00:04:24,120 --> 00:04:25,800 developed a big interest in Alicia. 71 00:04:26,400 --> 00:04:30,680 Actually, Alicia Benabuya became a topic of great interest since 72 00:04:30,680 --> 00:04:35,840 the Jewish Enlightenment, when I think many of the, you know, the 73 00:04:35,880 --> 00:04:40,640 the masquelib, the the Jews who were adopting modern Western 74 00:04:40,640 --> 00:04:44,160 ways and getting a secular education and so on, saw 75 00:04:44,160 --> 00:04:47,920 themselves connected to Alicia in certain ways. 76 00:04:48,160 --> 00:04:51,320 A little bit alienated from rabbinic tradition, a little bit 77 00:04:51,320 --> 00:04:55,480 outside of rabbinic tradition, maybe 1 foot in rabbinic 78 00:04:55,480 --> 00:05:00,200 tradition and one foot outside, and many of them wrote about 79 00:05:00,200 --> 00:05:03,160 Alicia. And kind of interpreted him. 80 00:05:04,040 --> 00:05:05,920 You know, in light of their experience, which is kind of 81 00:05:05,920 --> 00:05:09,640 what Milken Steinberg did too. So Alicia has been, you know, 82 00:05:09,680 --> 00:05:12,000 thought about and discussed. And there are many, many 83 00:05:12,000 --> 00:05:15,920 theories about what actually happened and who he was. 84 00:05:15,920 --> 00:05:18,480 And you know how he became ahair, right? 85 00:05:18,520 --> 00:05:22,880 The other this horrible apostate or heretic. 86 00:05:23,160 --> 00:05:25,200 So much so that the rabbis couldn't even say his name. 87 00:05:26,040 --> 00:05:30,080 So this is a very, very. Long and complicated chapter in 88 00:05:30,080 --> 00:05:31,680 Jewish literature and Jewish tradition. 89 00:05:31,680 --> 00:05:33,960 Called it a tradition. Well, what we're going to do 90 00:05:34,000 --> 00:05:36,600 today is start with the beginning. 91 00:05:36,600 --> 00:05:41,600 That is the earliest sources about Alicia Benabuya, and these 92 00:05:41,600 --> 00:05:45,400 sources appear in the Mishnah and the Tosefta. 93 00:05:45,480 --> 00:05:49,320 That is in the text we call Tana Edik from the period of the 94 00:05:49,320 --> 00:05:54,480 Tanaim that is up to about 200 CE when the Mishnah was edited. 95 00:05:54,720 --> 00:05:58,760 Maybe the Tosefta a little later, but these are before the 96 00:05:58,760 --> 00:06:02,320 Talmud and then so there's a there's some sources that. 97 00:06:02,880 --> 00:06:05,320 We'll talk about Alicia and the Mishnah well in the Tosefta 98 00:06:05,320 --> 00:06:09,200 related to the Mishnah and these sources being interpreted both 99 00:06:09,200 --> 00:06:11,440 in the Yurasami, the Jerusalem Talmud. 100 00:06:11,720 --> 00:06:13,880 And in the. Bodily the Babylonian Talmud to 101 00:06:14,200 --> 00:06:19,920 start the process of the stories about Alicia that become more 102 00:06:19,920 --> 00:06:23,680 fully developed there. So. 103 00:06:23,760 --> 00:06:26,080 So we'll look at those today and then we'll have to leave to 104 00:06:26,080 --> 00:06:29,560 another podcast, you know, another time the full story in 105 00:06:29,560 --> 00:06:31,760 the Yershami and in the Bodley, because these are very highly 106 00:06:31,760 --> 00:06:34,680 developed and long stories. So it's very rich material. 107 00:06:35,720 --> 00:06:39,200 But first, OK, in order to even understand these early 108 00:06:39,200 --> 00:06:43,360 traditions about Alicia Benabuya, we have to understand 109 00:06:43,360 --> 00:06:49,400 a form of mysticism that was practiced in rabbinic times, in 110 00:06:49,400 --> 00:06:53,920 Talmudic times before the Middle Ages, when a new form of 111 00:06:53,920 --> 00:07:00,960 mysticism, Kabbalah or where we have in the Zohar kind of took 112 00:07:00,960 --> 00:07:04,400 over and supplanted or superseded these earlier forms 113 00:07:04,400 --> 00:07:06,360 of mysticism. So I don't know if you've had on 114 00:07:06,360 --> 00:07:09,080 your podcast other scholars talking about mysticism and the 115 00:07:09,080 --> 00:07:13,560 Zohar and Kabbalah. Very much, very much so. 116 00:07:13,560 --> 00:07:15,000 And we're going to have a lot more. 117 00:07:15,440 --> 00:07:19,720 So we our our audience right now is familiar with the original 118 00:07:19,720 --> 00:07:23,240 mysticism, which is the masse Merkabah mysticism, Merkabah 119 00:07:23,240 --> 00:07:24,840 mysticism. OK, good. 120 00:07:25,040 --> 00:07:26,520 Yeah, you don't have to really. You can. 121 00:07:26,560 --> 00:07:28,560 You can maybe give a brief about it, but you know it's part of 122 00:07:28,560 --> 00:07:29,120 your. Presentation. 123 00:07:29,800 --> 00:07:31,480 So I'll give just a little bit about it. 124 00:07:31,480 --> 00:07:33,720 Because the the, as you mentioned, right before 125 00:07:33,720 --> 00:07:36,400 Kabbalah, there was an earlier kind of Jewish mysticism known 126 00:07:36,440 --> 00:07:39,600 as Merkabah mysticism or Hekhalok mysticism. 127 00:07:40,000 --> 00:07:44,880 So Merkabah refers to the chariot and this chariot. 128 00:07:45,600 --> 00:07:49,680 It comes to us, so we we, we hear about it first in the 129 00:07:49,680 --> 00:07:52,000 vision of Yukresko of the prophet Ezekiel. 130 00:07:52,000 --> 00:07:56,120 In chapters 143 through three, Yukresko has this unbelievable 131 00:07:56,120 --> 00:08:00,720 vision where the skies open and God writing his chariot, his 132 00:08:00,720 --> 00:08:06,360 chariot throne appears to Yukresko and he describes this 133 00:08:06,360 --> 00:08:08,720 throne or tries to describe it. It's a little hard to figure out 134 00:08:08,720 --> 00:08:11,400 exactly what he's talking about, but as there's radiant and 135 00:08:11,440 --> 00:08:14,640 there's colors and there's fire, there's a figure of a human and 136 00:08:14,640 --> 00:08:20,960 he's on a chariot that is perched on angels or some kind 137 00:08:20,960 --> 00:08:23,800 of beings with heads. It's not there if it's four 138 00:08:24,280 --> 00:08:28,680 different beings on each side or 4 beings total heads of a human, 139 00:08:29,280 --> 00:08:35,280 an eagle, a ox and a lion. These are the four kingly 140 00:08:35,280 --> 00:08:37,559 beasts, you know, the king of the burbs, so the king of the 141 00:08:37,559 --> 00:08:40,240 birds, the king of the beasts and the king of the wild 142 00:08:40,240 --> 00:08:43,400 animals. So all of these symbolize really 143 00:08:43,400 --> 00:08:47,120 kingship. So the the the vision of 144 00:08:47,120 --> 00:08:53,840 Yukreskil was understood to be how you know God existed up in 145 00:08:53,840 --> 00:08:55,320 heaven. That is usually God was up in 146 00:08:55,320 --> 00:08:58,520 the heavenly temple but he came down and appeared to Yukreskil 147 00:08:58,520 --> 00:09:01,400 on his throne. And this throne that Yukreskil 148 00:09:01,400 --> 00:09:05,040 saw was in this heavenly temple which was known as the Heikhao. 149 00:09:05,360 --> 00:09:07,600 That's why it's simply called Heikha lot. 150 00:09:08,160 --> 00:09:09,880 There were it was not just one temple. 151 00:09:09,880 --> 00:09:13,240 Sometimes they were understood to be 7 temples or 7 entrances 152 00:09:13,240 --> 00:09:17,640 or chambers really within one another where God on his throne 153 00:09:17,640 --> 00:09:22,040 was on the innermost one. And the goal of the Mystic was 154 00:09:22,040 --> 00:09:24,600 to have this visionary experience of God. 155 00:09:24,600 --> 00:09:28,840 So with some sort of out of out of body experience, the soul 156 00:09:28,840 --> 00:09:32,560 could leave the. Body go up to heaven in some 157 00:09:32,560 --> 00:09:34,960 way. Go through these, hey, hello to 158 00:09:34,960 --> 00:09:38,640 the innermost chamber and there get the vision of God on his 159 00:09:38,880 --> 00:09:41,280 throne. So I brought a little. 160 00:09:41,480 --> 00:09:44,200 I found some. Pictures of this you know, you 161 00:09:44,200 --> 00:09:47,440 can find these on on on Google Images, just because it's 162 00:09:47,440 --> 00:09:51,000 sometimes hard to, you know, understand exactly what this 163 00:09:51,000 --> 00:09:55,720 entails. And for those who are listening 164 00:09:55,720 --> 00:09:59,600 on the audio version, I recommend switching over to the 165 00:09:59,600 --> 00:10:04,120 YouTube to view the actual slideshow that Professor is 166 00:10:04,120 --> 00:10:05,560 going to be sharing with us right now. 167 00:10:05,560 --> 00:10:08,320 Yeah. So here's just a couple pictures 168 00:10:08,320 --> 00:10:11,520 of, you know, this was one from the the Renaissance painter 169 00:10:11,520 --> 00:10:16,480 Raphael in 1518 of that's supposed to be God, you know on 170 00:10:16,480 --> 00:10:18,920 this on this throne which is carried by beasts. 171 00:10:18,920 --> 00:10:21,880 That's the Merkava. You know, there's another one 172 00:10:22,520 --> 00:10:25,040 who understood the vision in slightly different terms, where 173 00:10:25,040 --> 00:10:29,240 again, you could see. Angels drawing this. 174 00:10:29,240 --> 00:10:35,080 Throne and there's God in a kind of human form there, you know. 175 00:10:35,080 --> 00:10:38,080 Still another vision like this. Again, there's some angelic 176 00:10:38,080 --> 00:10:41,240 beings there. This one's a little more modern 177 00:10:41,840 --> 00:10:44,160 obviously, but you know, has I think. 178 00:10:44,160 --> 00:10:47,200 I like, I like the colours he describes colours and radiance. 179 00:10:49,000 --> 00:10:52,440 And I couldn't find really any images of hey Halode except for 180 00:10:52,440 --> 00:10:54,560 this book. This is on the cover of a book 181 00:10:54,840 --> 00:10:58,240 about prayer and about mysticism. 182 00:10:58,240 --> 00:11:00,760 But there I think you get a sense of their chambers. 183 00:11:00,760 --> 00:11:03,560 Within chambers, that's kind of a heavenly temple. 184 00:11:03,880 --> 00:11:08,880 And in the innermost temple is, is that Merkava is the throne. 185 00:11:09,240 --> 00:11:13,160 So the goal of the Mystic is to go and get this vision and you 186 00:11:13,160 --> 00:11:15,560 know, what he would accomplish there is, first of all, just 187 00:11:15,560 --> 00:11:19,920 this amazing, you know, consummately unbelievable vision 188 00:11:19,920 --> 00:11:23,080 of God on his throne. You know what could be a greater 189 00:11:23,080 --> 00:11:28,000 spiritual experience than that? But also, you know, you could. 190 00:11:28,520 --> 00:11:30,440 The Mystic was able to ask God for things. 191 00:11:30,680 --> 00:11:33,320 You know, you and I, we're down here on earth. 192 00:11:33,320 --> 00:11:34,880 We're sitting in show. We're praying. 193 00:11:35,440 --> 00:11:37,560 You know, maybe God hears our prayers, maybe not. 194 00:11:37,920 --> 00:11:41,560 But if you're right before that throne, up in the heavenly 195 00:11:41,560 --> 00:11:43,160 temple. I mean, there's a very good 196 00:11:43,160 --> 00:11:44,520 chance God is going to answer you. 197 00:11:44,560 --> 00:11:47,880 So it wasn't just the sense that you wanted this incredible 198 00:11:47,880 --> 00:11:51,800 vision, it was that you also had this ability to actually ask for 199 00:11:51,840 --> 00:11:55,520 something and the suffering of the Jewish people or or 200 00:11:55,520 --> 00:11:58,720 something like that. Now that part of this, this, 201 00:11:58,760 --> 00:12:02,560 this Mirkava mysticism also included many, many angels 202 00:12:02,560 --> 00:12:07,040 because there were angels who some of the texts guard these. 203 00:12:07,960 --> 00:12:12,840 Different chambers and kind of prevent unworthy people of 204 00:12:12,840 --> 00:12:15,720 getting access to the Mirkava or the throne room. 205 00:12:16,040 --> 00:12:18,400 So there you required a whole lot of knowledge. 206 00:12:18,400 --> 00:12:21,240 Esoteric knowledge. You know, mystical knowledge. 207 00:12:21,640 --> 00:12:24,800 Of the names of angels or what you had to say or what you 208 00:12:24,800 --> 00:12:28,600 couldn't say to get through these angelic guards that were 209 00:12:28,600 --> 00:12:31,800 sometimes hostile to human beings, this is also a kind of 210 00:12:32,120 --> 00:12:34,520 motif that runs through hey call mysticism. 211 00:12:34,760 --> 00:12:37,800 And we find this actually very common in in rabbinic sources in 212 00:12:37,840 --> 00:12:40,280 a sort of different way. But there's a sort of 213 00:12:40,280 --> 00:12:44,800 competition between angels and humans as to who's better. 214 00:12:45,080 --> 00:12:48,320 And who God loves more. And the angels can even be 215 00:12:48,640 --> 00:12:51,760 sometimes hostile to Cubans, you know, a little less so in the 216 00:12:51,760 --> 00:12:54,720 Talmud, but a little more so in the hipolotic mysticism. 217 00:12:54,920 --> 00:12:58,400 So there were dangers involved in this quest, Dangers in terms 218 00:12:58,480 --> 00:13:02,240 of the angels, You. Know punishing you, even killing 219 00:13:02,240 --> 00:13:05,080 you. And also they were like with 220 00:13:05,120 --> 00:13:08,080 with many kinds of mysticism or esoteric knowledge. 221 00:13:08,360 --> 00:13:11,720 There was considered like dangers to the person who was 222 00:13:11,720 --> 00:13:15,200 trying to learn this if you weren't sufficiently grounded in 223 00:13:15,200 --> 00:13:16,160 your faith. And if you. 224 00:13:16,160 --> 00:13:18,960 Didn't know you know, rabbinic tradition sufficiently. 225 00:13:19,280 --> 00:13:24,240 You might come to the wrong conclusions and you might think 226 00:13:24,240 --> 00:13:26,440 some heretical kind of thoughts. You know, we know. 227 00:13:26,440 --> 00:13:29,040 This from the Zohar and mysticism, Kabbalah, later 228 00:13:29,040 --> 00:13:30,800 Kabbalah. You know, you shouldn't engage 229 00:13:30,800 --> 00:13:34,000 in this until you're 40, until you're mature, until you're 230 00:13:34,000 --> 00:13:37,440 rabbi or something like that. So, you know, this was part of 231 00:13:37,440 --> 00:13:39,960 this esoteric tradition that the rabbis were kind of worried 232 00:13:39,960 --> 00:13:42,320 about that shouldn't be accessible to everybody. 233 00:13:43,120 --> 00:13:45,760 So this is, this is kind of the background because I think this 234 00:13:45,760 --> 00:13:49,800 is, you know, the way the rabbis in the earliest sources, the 235 00:13:49,800 --> 00:13:54,320 taniatic sources, understood what had happened to Alicia. 236 00:13:55,080 --> 00:13:58,160 Although what we're going to see is that there's a long 237 00:13:58,160 --> 00:14:01,360 development within rabbinic tradition itself, within the 238 00:14:01,360 --> 00:14:04,960 Talmud itself, where later tamunic sources or later Tamunic 239 00:14:04,960 --> 00:14:07,680 rabbis perhaps didn't even understand these earlier sources 240 00:14:07,960 --> 00:14:10,000 and they themselves. Were trying to make sense. 241 00:14:10,040 --> 00:14:13,720 Of, you know what the real story of Alicia was, and really 242 00:14:13,720 --> 00:14:21,720 interpreted in different ways. So with that kind of background, 243 00:14:21,720 --> 00:14:24,520 I think we should, we should turn to the sources themselves. 244 00:14:24,520 --> 00:14:26,480 Does that make sense? Yeah. 245 00:14:26,480 --> 00:14:29,520 OK, so I'm gonna share my screen again, and we're gonna go to the 246 00:14:29,520 --> 00:14:30,760 sources. We're gonna start with the 247 00:14:30,760 --> 00:14:34,120 Mishnah, which is really the basis for the Tosefta, where we 248 00:14:34,120 --> 00:14:39,600 get our first mention of Alicia. OK All right, you guys see that? 249 00:14:39,600 --> 00:14:41,960 Does that look good? Perfect. 250 00:14:42,440 --> 00:14:46,200 OK, I gotta get to the next slide. 251 00:14:48,480 --> 00:14:52,120 OK. All right, so so here we have 252 00:14:52,120 --> 00:14:57,800 the Mishnah, and you can see that this is Mishnah Khagiga 21. 253 00:14:58,480 --> 00:15:04,600 And this Mishnah deals with these esoteric or dangerous 254 00:15:04,920 --> 00:15:08,040 subjects that the rabbis thought. 255 00:15:09,760 --> 00:15:11,680 It should not be taught in public and maybe should be 256 00:15:11,680 --> 00:15:14,760 limited, you know, to those who were at a higher spiritual 257 00:15:14,760 --> 00:15:16,680 level. So you can see it starts out. 258 00:15:16,680 --> 00:15:19,000 I'll just read the English for those of you who want to follow 259 00:15:19,000 --> 00:15:20,720 in the Hebrew, look at it occasionally. 260 00:15:21,080 --> 00:15:24,360 You know, one may not expound the topic of forbidden sexual 261 00:15:24,360 --> 00:15:26,720 relations before three or more individuals. 262 00:15:26,720 --> 00:15:30,600 We won't get into exactly why for now, But you can see this is 263 00:15:30,600 --> 00:15:33,880 something that has, you know, shouldn't be publicized or done 264 00:15:33,880 --> 00:15:37,840 in public, a limit of three. Nor the act of creation between 265 00:15:37,840 --> 00:15:42,320 2:00 or more individuals. So how God created the world 266 00:15:42,320 --> 00:15:46,640 again was was considered, you know, this kind of very, very 267 00:15:46,640 --> 00:15:50,360 complicated theological topic. That shouldn't really be taught 268 00:15:50,480 --> 00:15:55,240 to, you know, just anybody or or in a public setting, because it 269 00:15:55,240 --> 00:15:58,880 raised all sorts of questions. And then we get normally one 270 00:15:58,880 --> 00:16:04,320 expound by oneself the divine. Chariot the Merkava, unless he 271 00:16:04,320 --> 00:16:07,000 is wise and understands most, matters on his own. 272 00:16:08,040 --> 00:16:13,280 So this talks actually about expounding the divine chariot, 273 00:16:13,280 --> 00:16:18,960 meaning studying the portion of the Bible that talks about the 274 00:16:18,960 --> 00:16:23,200 chariot, but it doesn't talk actually about a kind of 275 00:16:23,200 --> 00:16:24,920 mystical experience itself, unless. 276 00:16:25,040 --> 00:16:27,920 You know, learning about it is itself by definition mystical. 277 00:16:29,480 --> 00:16:32,520 But nevertheless, you can see the Rabbis in this Mishnah are 278 00:16:32,520 --> 00:16:38,480 very cautious about this kind of knowledge being disseminated. 279 00:16:40,640 --> 00:16:45,160 One, it shouldn't even be taught to another person, but one great 280 00:16:45,160 --> 00:16:50,080 rabbi or one rabbi is able to do this if he's able to understand 281 00:16:50,080 --> 00:16:52,800 it himself. So there's something considered. 282 00:16:52,800 --> 00:16:56,760 You can see that's kind of dangerous about looking into 283 00:16:56,760 --> 00:17:00,120 this mystical subject that the Rabbi's were very cautious 284 00:17:00,120 --> 00:17:02,800 about, you know, people doing by themselves. 285 00:17:02,800 --> 00:17:06,040 They didn't even want to teach it, you know, but they thought 286 00:17:06,040 --> 00:17:08,680 if you were sufficiently wise you could kind of figure it out 287 00:17:08,680 --> 00:17:12,960 yourself, then that was OK. So this is this is all we get in 288 00:17:12,960 --> 00:17:14,680 the Mishnah. And you can see Alicia Benabuti 289 00:17:14,680 --> 00:17:19,359 is not even mentioned or as any sage but but in the Tosefta and 290 00:17:19,359 --> 00:17:22,000 just to remind everybody, we all know what the Tosefta was. 291 00:17:22,319 --> 00:17:24,240 It's right. The Tosefta is the supplement to 292 00:17:24,240 --> 00:17:27,640 the Mishnah which. Is structured along the same 293 00:17:27,640 --> 00:17:30,280 lines as the Mishnah. So for every tract date of 294 00:17:30,280 --> 00:17:33,320 Mishnah, almost you have a tract date of so Sefta. 295 00:17:33,320 --> 00:17:36,200 And you know a lot of this material was material that 296 00:17:36,320 --> 00:17:40,880 Rebbehuna Nasi, who edited the Mishnah, decided to leave out 297 00:17:40,960 --> 00:17:42,640 for whatever reason. He thought it wasn't 298 00:17:42,640 --> 00:17:45,200 sufficiently authoritative or important or just didn't have 299 00:17:45,200 --> 00:17:47,440 room. But much of it was collected in 300 00:17:47,440 --> 00:17:52,360 this parallel text that so Sefta you know, maybe edited just a 301 00:17:52,360 --> 00:17:55,240 bit of a little later, but it has the same sages. 302 00:17:55,600 --> 00:17:58,680 As a period the missioner, so we consider it Tani Edik from that 303 00:17:58,680 --> 00:18:04,320 same pre tamuric time up to about 200 CE when the missioner 304 00:18:04,320 --> 00:18:07,040 was edited. So in the Tosefta you can see 305 00:18:07,040 --> 00:18:10,440 this is Tosefta Khadiga. So it's the parallel track tape. 306 00:18:11,200 --> 00:18:14,600 It goes along with the Mishna. We get a slightly different 307 00:18:14,600 --> 00:18:19,400 version of this mystical Enterprises, Merkava or Hekolot 308 00:18:19,400 --> 00:18:22,920 mysticism. So it starts out four entered 309 00:18:22,920 --> 00:18:26,160 the Orchard, 4 entered the Pardes. 310 00:18:26,160 --> 00:18:32,560 The word for orchard is Pardes, Benazi, Benzoma, Acher, the 311 00:18:32,560 --> 00:18:37,240 other that is Alicia and Ravi Akiva. 312 00:18:38,200 --> 00:18:42,360 Now this is clearly a parable because. 313 00:18:42,600 --> 00:18:45,680 When you talk about esoteric subjects that you don't want 314 00:18:45,680 --> 00:18:48,280 everybody, everybody to understand, and we just saw in 315 00:18:48,280 --> 00:18:50,160 the missionary they didn't really want to talk about it. 316 00:18:50,440 --> 00:18:53,680 You talk about it in parables, but of course that makes it very 317 00:18:53,680 --> 00:18:56,240 difficult for the audience if you're not, if you don't have 318 00:18:56,240 --> 00:19:00,440 any kind of direct, you know, tradition from the person who 319 00:19:00,440 --> 00:19:03,040 made the parables to understand what they're talking about. 320 00:19:03,240 --> 00:19:06,320 So we're not even clear exactly what this means, but the orchard 321 00:19:06,320 --> 00:19:11,720 seems to be a, you know, a parable for mystical 322 00:19:11,720 --> 00:19:16,040 speculation, for this kind of Merkava or Hekolok mysticism. 323 00:19:16,320 --> 00:19:19,560 SO4 entered the orchard. Seems to be these 4 rabbis 324 00:19:19,960 --> 00:19:21,320 engaged. In this. 325 00:19:22,120 --> 00:19:26,440 Merkava activity or this hekolot activity, they tried to get to 326 00:19:26,440 --> 00:19:31,680 that chariot to the throne up in heaven and get through those 327 00:19:31,680 --> 00:19:33,800 angels and through those chambers and get there. 328 00:19:34,400 --> 00:19:36,880 But as we see in the next section, it didn't go so well. 329 00:19:36,880 --> 00:19:42,120 It's not for everyone. 1 gazed and died, 1 gazed and was 330 00:19:42,120 --> 00:19:48,240 harmed. 1 gazed and cut the chutes, and one went up in 331 00:19:48,240 --> 00:19:49,960 peace. And went down in peace. 332 00:19:53,760 --> 00:19:57,480 So you can see for for the first two of them, Benaza and Benzoma. 333 00:19:57,520 --> 00:20:01,040 The missioner will go on to tell us this Tosefta, Sorry will, go 334 00:20:01,040 --> 00:20:03,280 on and tell us a little bit. You know what happened to 335 00:20:03,280 --> 00:20:06,520 Benzama, Benaza and Benzoma. I skipped over it here just 336 00:20:06,520 --> 00:20:09,080 because you know that's not our main focus. 337 00:20:09,440 --> 00:20:11,480 But you know things went bad for them. 338 00:20:11,640 --> 00:20:13,200 One died. One was harmed. 339 00:20:13,880 --> 00:20:16,360 And then one. Gazed and cut the shoots and the 340 00:20:16,360 --> 00:20:19,800 Tosefta tells us Alicia Alicia gazed and cut the shoots. 341 00:20:20,120 --> 00:20:23,800 That was Alicia Benabuya. And then one went up in peace 342 00:20:23,800 --> 00:20:25,720 and went down in peace. That's Rebbe Akiva. 343 00:20:25,720 --> 00:20:29,480 And again the Tosefta goes on to tell us about a little bit more 344 00:20:29,480 --> 00:20:33,040 about Rebbe Akiva. Now what does this all mean is 345 00:20:33,080 --> 00:20:37,960 we're not totally sure, but you can see a little bit from even 346 00:20:37,960 --> 00:20:40,520 from section B there where it says 1 gaze. 347 00:20:41,000 --> 00:20:46,720 So So what is the gaze? The gaze seems to be this, an 348 00:20:46,720 --> 00:20:50,000 attempt to get a vision of God on the Mirkava. 349 00:20:50,000 --> 00:20:52,960 This was, as some people call it, a visionary type of 350 00:20:52,960 --> 00:20:56,840 mysticism, you know, seeing the Mirkava seeing God on his 351 00:20:56,840 --> 00:21:01,240 throne. So for the three of them, it it 352 00:21:01,240 --> 00:21:05,480 seems like what this parable is talking about is indeed. 353 00:21:07,040 --> 00:21:10,320 This kind of Mirkava mysticism where they tried to get up and 354 00:21:10,320 --> 00:21:12,720 and and see the throne and maybe at least the two of them who 355 00:21:12,720 --> 00:21:14,880 were harmed, one died and was harmed. 356 00:21:15,360 --> 00:21:17,280 You know, we're struck down by these angels there. 357 00:21:18,600 --> 00:21:21,000 What does it mean to gaze and cut the shoots? 358 00:21:21,000 --> 00:21:22,440 OK, we'll talk about that in a second. 359 00:21:22,440 --> 00:21:25,080 And then again, Ravi Akiba went up in peace and went down in 360 00:21:25,080 --> 00:21:26,800 peace. So there it doesn't mention 361 00:21:26,800 --> 00:21:30,080 gaze, but it mentions going up and down, and that would be 362 00:21:30,080 --> 00:21:32,520 consistent with Merkabah mysticism. 363 00:21:32,520 --> 00:21:37,000 He went up through the hekolot to the Merkabah, the throne 364 00:21:37,000 --> 00:21:40,920 itself, and then he came back down and he came out in peace. 365 00:21:41,400 --> 00:21:42,880 You know, Ravi Akiba was successful. 366 00:21:43,360 --> 00:21:44,920 But we can see it was very, very dangerous. 367 00:21:44,920 --> 00:21:46,640 And this is at least in the rabbi's eyes. 368 00:21:46,920 --> 00:21:49,760 This was one of the reasons they wanted to limit its audience and 369 00:21:49,760 --> 00:21:53,520 not even really tell us about what is going on now. 370 00:21:53,520 --> 00:21:58,040 Cutting the shoots is is very unclear, but of course this is 371 00:21:58,040 --> 00:22:01,240 part of the parable that we don't fully understand. 372 00:22:02,440 --> 00:22:07,800 It seems that it's what Alicia did again that you know, the 373 00:22:07,800 --> 00:22:12,760 best guess of scholars simply based on this context is if you 374 00:22:12,760 --> 00:22:17,280 think about an orchard and cutting down shoots, cutting 375 00:22:17,280 --> 00:22:25,480 down plants, perhaps what what the Tosefta means is that this, 376 00:22:25,480 --> 00:22:29,400 this orchard, the orchard, you know, was God's orchard or was a 377 00:22:29,400 --> 00:22:32,400 King's orchard, you know this is the allegory orchard. 378 00:22:32,400 --> 00:22:37,040 Was apartheid was the special gardens or orchard of a Persian 379 00:22:37,040 --> 00:22:38,760 king. I mean that's where the the word 380 00:22:38,760 --> 00:22:44,160 comes to us from. And these were his private area. 381 00:22:44,240 --> 00:22:47,840 You know it's where the king relaxed or where the king well 382 00:22:47,920 --> 00:22:50,200 went. It wasn't for everybody and it 383 00:22:50,200 --> 00:22:56,480 was surrounded by plants or trees or a fence or something 384 00:22:56,480 --> 00:23:00,640 like that to keep it private. So it's possible What Alicia did 385 00:23:01,960 --> 00:23:08,040 his sin in this earliest source was he cut down those plants 386 00:23:08,040 --> 00:23:11,160 that it made the the orchard private. 387 00:23:11,160 --> 00:23:14,240 It made this mystical vision private, right? 388 00:23:14,240 --> 00:23:17,720 If God is the king and the orchard is somehow his realm up 389 00:23:17,720 --> 00:23:20,920 there, or how to get access to it, Alicia tried, in other 390 00:23:20,920 --> 00:23:23,280 words, to open it up to other people. 391 00:23:24,440 --> 00:23:28,120 He cut down the chutes, protecting or enclosing this. 392 00:23:28,120 --> 00:23:30,360 Orchard, and that's what he did, was wrong. 393 00:23:30,840 --> 00:23:32,680 But again, exactly what that means, we don't know. 394 00:23:32,680 --> 00:23:34,560 It's, you know, he tried to publicize it. 395 00:23:34,560 --> 00:23:36,080 He tried to teach it to other people. 396 00:23:36,280 --> 00:23:38,360 He tried to teach it to people who were unworthy. 397 00:23:38,360 --> 00:23:42,400 He talked about it not not 100% clear. 398 00:23:42,560 --> 00:23:45,280 And and I keep emphasizing that because that's we'll see. 399 00:23:46,120 --> 00:23:49,000 The rabbis of Talmud didn't really understand this any 400 00:23:49,000 --> 00:23:51,880 better than we did, and they did their best. 401 00:23:51,880 --> 00:23:55,320 To make sense of it. But the way they made sense of 402 00:23:55,320 --> 00:23:58,520 it, you know, might not be exactly what it meant in its 403 00:23:58,520 --> 00:24:02,400 original tradition, in this tradition, in the Tosefta, you 404 00:24:02,400 --> 00:24:04,680 know, because it is told in a kind of parable. 405 00:24:05,960 --> 00:24:09,440 Now we do get one other piece of information about Alicia, and 406 00:24:09,440 --> 00:24:13,520 this is that the Tosefta adds a biblical verse. 407 00:24:14,000 --> 00:24:16,280 So it's in section D You can see it says. 408 00:24:16,280 --> 00:24:21,840 Scripture says about. Him Let now not your mouth lead 409 00:24:21,840 --> 00:24:26,880 your flesh to sin and do not say before the malach. 410 00:24:26,880 --> 00:24:29,320 Now we know that malach can either be an Angel or a 411 00:24:29,320 --> 00:24:32,000 messenger. I guess we can take it for Angel 412 00:24:32,000 --> 00:24:35,520 for now. Do not say before the Angel that 413 00:24:35,520 --> 00:24:41,520 it was an error, else God may be angered by your talk and destroy 414 00:24:41,520 --> 00:24:46,360 the work of your hands. So the toseft is saying is this 415 00:24:46,360 --> 00:24:50,760 verse somehow captures what Alicia did wrong? 416 00:24:53,200 --> 00:24:55,160 But the problem is this verse is very opaque. 417 00:24:55,560 --> 00:24:58,360 I mean, do you want guys? Understand this verse you know 418 00:24:58,360 --> 00:25:01,840 what does this mean? How does your mouth lead your 419 00:25:01,840 --> 00:25:07,480 flesh to sin? And don't say that before the 420 00:25:08,080 --> 00:25:10,560 malach. That's it's an error or God may 421 00:25:10,560 --> 00:25:12,960 be angered. There's a little tension here 422 00:25:13,280 --> 00:25:18,160 between starting with the malach and then shifting to. 423 00:25:19,080 --> 00:25:23,040 You know to God. In the Hebrew, I'll tell more. 424 00:25:23,160 --> 00:25:27,960 I'll tell Marley thing Ham Allah and then lama eats sofa. 425 00:25:27,960 --> 00:25:31,840 Elohim, What is this Angel doing, you know? 426 00:25:33,000 --> 00:25:35,000 And what is it that causes God to be angry? 427 00:25:35,000 --> 00:25:36,400 What is destroying the work of the half? 428 00:25:36,640 --> 00:25:39,880 So this verse, I mean, there definitely seems to be something 429 00:25:40,000 --> 00:25:44,240 dumb that's wrong, but it doesn't really help us that much 430 00:25:44,240 --> 00:25:47,200 understand what Alicia did wrong, or what the Tosefta 431 00:25:47,200 --> 00:25:49,160 thinks he did. Wrong, because it's such a 432 00:25:49,160 --> 00:25:52,800 difficult verse. The shot of this verse, if you 433 00:25:52,800 --> 00:25:55,640 look at biblical commentators, is probably about something 434 00:25:55,640 --> 00:26:00,920 about vows. That is, not taking a vow and 435 00:26:00,920 --> 00:26:03,720 then violating it. So how does your mouth lead your 436 00:26:03,720 --> 00:26:08,000 flesh to sin? You you take a vow, you know I'm 437 00:26:08,000 --> 00:26:12,840 never going to eat meat again. And then if you eat meat, you've 438 00:26:12,840 --> 00:26:16,360 violated your vow, so you've sinned, and maybe that's your 439 00:26:16,360 --> 00:26:19,920 flesh is sinning in some way and and you shouldn't. 440 00:26:19,920 --> 00:26:23,880 Then at that point you can't plead to the Angel that you made 441 00:26:23,880 --> 00:26:27,760 this vow in error, because you've taken God's name in this 442 00:26:27,760 --> 00:26:29,840 vow and God will be angry and punish you. 443 00:26:30,120 --> 00:26:33,840 I mean, that's probably sort of close to the shock, but clearly 444 00:26:33,840 --> 00:26:37,960 that's not what the Tosefta means here in this context. 445 00:26:38,840 --> 00:26:41,640 But we don't really know what the Tosefta means, except you 446 00:26:41,640 --> 00:26:46,280 can see a little bit about this malach, this Angel which. 447 00:26:47,040 --> 00:26:51,760 And this Angel and God being angry and making some sort of 448 00:26:51,760 --> 00:26:56,760 anger, making some sort of error, you know, that does sound 449 00:26:56,760 --> 00:27:00,480 like part of the dangers that are warned about in these 450 00:27:00,480 --> 00:27:04,360 hekalot, in these Merkava texts, that the angels might punish 451 00:27:04,360 --> 00:27:07,560 you, you might get hurt by angels, you know, you might get 452 00:27:07,560 --> 00:27:10,720 destroyed. But again, it's very, very, very 453 00:27:10,880 --> 00:27:14,400 inscrutable. And you know, So what, what I 454 00:27:14,400 --> 00:27:17,720 want us to understand just before we go on is that when the 455 00:27:17,720 --> 00:27:22,480 Talmudic stages in the Yerushalmi and in the Babli came 456 00:27:22,480 --> 00:27:27,000 to try to make sense of this tradition and understand what 457 00:27:27,000 --> 00:27:31,400 happened to Alicia, I think they were just as puzzled as it. 458 00:27:31,800 --> 00:27:34,840 But as we are today. In other words, they did not 459 00:27:35,040 --> 00:27:40,440 have some sort of direct oral tradition about what actually 460 00:27:40,440 --> 00:27:43,320 happened to Alicia. And they were left, like we are, 461 00:27:43,320 --> 00:27:44,920 to try to make sense of the Tosefta. 462 00:27:45,840 --> 00:27:47,640 You know, they knew that kind of background. 463 00:27:47,640 --> 00:27:49,920 They knew a little bit about meerkaba mysticism. 464 00:27:49,920 --> 00:27:53,000 Hey hello mysticism. At least some of the rabbis, but 465 00:27:53,080 --> 00:27:54,480 exactly what the Tosefta is talking. 466 00:27:54,480 --> 00:27:58,120 About they didn't know. OK, so you know, the point is 467 00:27:58,120 --> 00:28:01,680 that, you know, there's a sort of sense I think in the popular 468 00:28:01,680 --> 00:28:04,600 imagination and people who have sometimes read Milton Steinberg 469 00:28:04,600 --> 00:28:07,640 and read other books about Alicia is like we know exactly 470 00:28:07,640 --> 00:28:11,440 what happened to Alicia and. You know, we have these. 471 00:28:11,800 --> 00:28:13,760 Biographical traditions about him. 472 00:28:15,120 --> 00:28:18,200 But in the earlier sources, this is all we have, and the 473 00:28:18,200 --> 00:28:22,400 biographical traditions we're going to get to now are really 474 00:28:22,400 --> 00:28:25,040 just attempts to make sense of this early. 475 00:28:25,040 --> 00:28:27,800 Tradition. Hey, that makes sense. 476 00:28:28,360 --> 00:28:29,560 OK? It'll make a little more sense 477 00:28:29,600 --> 00:28:31,240 as as we get to it. All right? 478 00:28:31,240 --> 00:28:32,040 A. Lot. 479 00:28:32,680 --> 00:28:33,480 Of sense. A lot of sense. 480 00:28:33,480 --> 00:28:36,120 OK, All right. So let's move then to the 481 00:28:36,120 --> 00:28:39,320 Yurashami and see what the Yurashami says. 482 00:28:39,440 --> 00:28:45,160 OK, so the Yerushalmi as we know is you know is a commentary to 483 00:28:45,160 --> 00:28:48,720 the Mishnah and it follows the same order and structure as the 484 00:28:48,720 --> 00:28:51,120 Mishnah. So for Bishnah tractate Khagiga 485 00:28:51,480 --> 00:28:55,840 we have Yerushalmi, Tractate Khagiga, and many times in the 486 00:28:55,840 --> 00:28:58,480 Yerushalmi the Tosefta which also follows the Mishnah as 487 00:28:58,480 --> 00:29:02,200 quoted in the Irishami. So here in Yerushalami Khagiga 488 00:29:02,200 --> 00:29:05,640 in the same chapter. We get. 489 00:29:06,400 --> 00:29:09,360 The quotation of the Tosefta. And then we get the Yrushami's 490 00:29:09,360 --> 00:29:12,160 attempt to understand it. OK, so you can see what I've put 491 00:29:12,160 --> 00:29:15,240 in yellow at the top layer there. 492 00:29:15,560 --> 00:29:19,520 The top row akhair gazed and and cut the shoots. 493 00:29:19,520 --> 00:29:22,320 That's just this quote from Persefta. 494 00:29:22,600 --> 00:29:25,680 Kagiga, right? Well, we have in the in the 495 00:29:25,680 --> 00:29:27,960 Tosefta Alicia gazed and cut the shoots. 496 00:29:27,960 --> 00:29:31,240 But it first it starts out with four entered the orchard, 497 00:29:31,240 --> 00:29:34,640 talking about Alicia and Akhair. There's actually some variation 498 00:29:34,640 --> 00:29:37,920 in the manuscripts of the SEPTA about using the term Akher and 499 00:29:37,920 --> 00:29:40,600 Alicia, but clearly they're they're used interchangeable 500 00:29:40,600 --> 00:29:43,800 there. So the Tosefta says Akher, you 501 00:29:43,800 --> 00:29:46,840 know, gazed and cuts the shoes, basically quoting the Tosefka. 502 00:29:48,520 --> 00:29:52,000 And now the Yerosami tells us, you know, ostensibly what seems 503 00:29:52,000 --> 00:29:56,080 to be some other traditions about Alicia, but I'm going to 504 00:29:56,080 --> 00:29:58,720 claim they're simply attempts to understand the Tosefta. 505 00:29:58,920 --> 00:30:00,320 They're not really independent of it. 506 00:30:00,920 --> 00:30:04,440 So what do we have? The YEROSAMI says Who is Akher? 507 00:30:05,160 --> 00:30:09,640 Alicia Benabuya, Who would kill the young students of Torah? 508 00:30:11,040 --> 00:30:16,120 Now pause for a second audience and tell me how is the Yurasami 509 00:30:16,120 --> 00:30:19,720 understanding. The Tosefka. 510 00:30:19,840 --> 00:30:23,800 How is 1? You know this first section in 511 00:30:23,800 --> 00:30:29,400 the Yurasami understanding that first yellow row lower, lower A, 512 00:30:30,080 --> 00:30:35,320 lower case A in the Tosefka. The shoots, The shoots being 513 00:30:35,840 --> 00:30:39,640 young students of Torah cutting, the shoots would be essentially 514 00:30:39,640 --> 00:30:41,280 killing the shoots. Exactly. 515 00:30:41,280 --> 00:30:44,600 So you know what? What is so heinous that Akar did 516 00:30:44,600 --> 00:30:46,960 that, Alicia did that? You know, the rabbis couldn't 517 00:30:46,960 --> 00:30:49,640 even mention his name and they have to call it the other. 518 00:30:50,640 --> 00:30:53,440 Well, obviously it's not cutting, you know, real plants. 519 00:30:53,440 --> 00:30:55,600 What's wrong with that? And you know, the cutting, the 520 00:30:55,600 --> 00:30:59,880 shoots is clearly a parable. So how do we decode the parable? 521 00:31:00,520 --> 00:31:04,440 So as you very astutely realized, cutting is understood 522 00:31:04,440 --> 00:31:08,000 as killing and shoots young plants. 523 00:31:08,040 --> 00:31:12,760 Young growth is understood as killing young students of Torah. 524 00:31:13,120 --> 00:31:18,400 So you know in some of the the stories, the retellings of the 525 00:31:18,400 --> 00:31:21,280 tummy nutrition about Alicia, you know, he does these terrible 526 00:31:21,280 --> 00:31:23,760 things. But this is really just the 527 00:31:24,120 --> 00:31:27,120 Yerushalmi attempting to understand. 528 00:31:27,120 --> 00:31:30,440 The SO SEPTA. Really just that line of 529 00:31:30,440 --> 00:31:33,360 Tosefta, is that the correct understanding? 530 00:31:33,640 --> 00:31:35,120 I don't know. I don't think so. 531 00:31:35,120 --> 00:31:36,800 I think the correct understanding is probably more 532 00:31:36,800 --> 00:31:40,400 in terms of sort of a mystical enterprise, but this is how the 533 00:31:40,400 --> 00:31:43,560 Yerushami takes. So, and I think you're saying 534 00:31:43,560 --> 00:31:47,360 that because it's hard to understand in the context of the 535 00:31:47,360 --> 00:31:53,200 Pardes what how killing young tourist students has anything to 536 00:31:53,200 --> 00:31:58,560 do with, you know, gazing and having that experience leading. 537 00:31:58,720 --> 00:32:00,240 How do they, how do they connect? 538 00:32:00,280 --> 00:32:02,920 I'm not so sure because that's what I mean trying to say. 539 00:32:03,240 --> 00:32:06,600 If the parties is referring to some sort of Merkava or hey 540 00:32:06,600 --> 00:32:10,000 Khalot mystical enterprise, you know everything we understand 541 00:32:10,000 --> 00:32:13,640 about what that involved. I mean had nothing to do with 542 00:32:13,880 --> 00:32:15,560 other people or killing people or. 543 00:32:15,600 --> 00:32:18,600 Young students. You know, it had to do with out 544 00:32:18,600 --> 00:32:21,960 of body experience of your soul, you know, up into these heavenly 545 00:32:21,960 --> 00:32:24,760 realms. So it's the Urshami, it seems to 546 00:32:24,760 --> 00:32:27,160 me. Either It kind of understood, 547 00:32:27,160 --> 00:32:30,800 but it didn't want us to, didn't want us to understand. 548 00:32:30,800 --> 00:32:33,840 That is, it didn't want its audience to know anything about 549 00:32:33,840 --> 00:32:38,280 that mystical background because the Yershomi was trying to move 550 00:32:38,720 --> 00:32:42,280 away from it. Or suppress it essentially. 551 00:32:42,680 --> 00:32:45,880 Or the scholars of the Yershomi just didn't even understand it. 552 00:32:46,000 --> 00:32:48,880 I mean, that's possible too, but they give us this 553 00:32:48,880 --> 00:32:51,120 interpretation. And then you can see in in the 554 00:32:51,120 --> 00:32:56,640 next row, letter capital letter B, they said he would kill every 555 00:32:56,640 --> 00:33:00,760 student whom he saw distinguish himself in Torah. 556 00:33:02,560 --> 00:33:08,280 So that's very similar to the previous row, and it doesn't add 557 00:33:08,280 --> 00:33:14,120 much, but it does add every student whom he saw. 558 00:33:15,480 --> 00:33:19,080 Why is it important to say every student whom he? 559 00:33:19,080 --> 00:33:21,560 Saw. It gives a connection. 560 00:33:21,600 --> 00:33:23,520 It gives a connection back to the gates. 561 00:33:23,840 --> 00:33:27,800 Exactly so the the Tosefta says he gazed and cut the shoots. 562 00:33:28,160 --> 00:33:32,000 So the Yerushalmi I think is making two sort of similar tries 563 00:33:32,240 --> 00:33:34,800 to interpret. That the first basically just 564 00:33:34,800 --> 00:33:37,320 interprets, cut the shoots, he would kill the young students of 565 00:33:37,320 --> 00:33:42,320 Torah and the second says he saw these young students distinguish 566 00:33:42,320 --> 00:33:44,760 themselves. I guess shoot being a, you know, 567 00:33:45,000 --> 00:33:47,480 a good plant, therefore a good student of Torah. 568 00:33:47,760 --> 00:33:50,000 And then he would kill them, cut them down. 569 00:33:51,160 --> 00:33:53,520 So it's a second attempt to understand the Tosefta to take 570 00:33:53,520 --> 00:33:56,680 into more data that there's a gaze and cut to shoot. 571 00:33:57,280 --> 00:34:01,520 OK, so this is these two are different versions of Yaroshami 572 00:34:01,560 --> 00:34:04,640 interpretation #1 or Yaroshami story #1. 573 00:34:05,360 --> 00:34:09,840 Now Yaroshami goes on to give what it presents as an addition, 574 00:34:09,840 --> 00:34:12,800 like he did something else, but it's really another kind of 575 00:34:12,800 --> 00:34:16,360 interpretation of Sosefta. So let's look at #2 there. 576 00:34:17,199 --> 00:34:20,920 Not only that. But he would go to the meeting 577 00:34:20,920 --> 00:34:25,320 place, the school or the Beit Madras. 578 00:34:25,400 --> 00:34:30,400 The Yurasami calls this a baitvada or bevada, what they 579 00:34:30,400 --> 00:34:32,360 probably sometimes calls a bait Madras. 580 00:34:32,679 --> 00:34:34,159 So we would go to this meeting place. 581 00:34:34,159 --> 00:34:37,520 He would go to the school and see children in front of their 582 00:34:37,520 --> 00:34:43,000 rabbi of their teacher. And he would say, what are these 583 00:34:43,960 --> 00:34:46,360 sitting and doing here? This one's profession is a 584 00:34:46,360 --> 00:34:47,920 builder. This one's profession is a 585 00:34:47,920 --> 00:34:49,560 Carpenter. This one's profession is a 586 00:34:49,560 --> 00:34:52,400 hunter. That one's profession is a 587 00:34:52,400 --> 00:34:54,239 tailor. In other words, they shouldn't 588 00:34:54,239 --> 00:34:57,440 shouldn't be learning Torah. They should be. 589 00:34:58,000 --> 00:35:01,120 Engaging in these kind of careers, you know, preparing for 590 00:35:01,120 --> 00:35:03,840 these kind of careers. When they heard this, they would 591 00:35:03,840 --> 00:35:09,800 leave him and go. Away now I think this also goes 592 00:35:09,800 --> 00:35:15,160 back to the So Sefta that line up above that we saw Akher gazed 593 00:35:15,160 --> 00:35:20,040 and cut the shoots. You can see first of all is that 594 00:35:20,040 --> 00:35:23,760 he would go to the meeting house and see children. 595 00:35:24,720 --> 00:35:28,520 So again we have this seeing that's interpreting Akher gaze 596 00:35:29,440 --> 00:35:31,920 and the shoots again our children. 597 00:35:32,800 --> 00:35:38,560 But in this version, how is cut the shoots cut being? 598 00:35:38,560 --> 00:35:43,840 Understood. It's not that it would kill the 599 00:35:43,840 --> 00:35:47,680 students, but he would cut them off, right? 600 00:35:47,680 --> 00:35:52,240 Cut them off from Torah or cut them off from tradition. 601 00:35:52,680 --> 00:35:59,200 So cut the shoots in two is he would cut off the children from 602 00:35:59,760 --> 00:36:01,960 learning Torah. I'm wondering if the fact that 603 00:36:01,960 --> 00:36:04,160 he's saying something would go with the last part. 604 00:36:04,720 --> 00:36:07,200 Exactly. Oh my God, Benji, you are you 605 00:36:07,200 --> 00:36:10,240 are, you know, the model student who already are catching on. 606 00:36:11,680 --> 00:36:18,680 So at this with this story the the Urshami begins to take into 607 00:36:18,680 --> 00:36:23,600 account the other datum that it has from the Tosefta, which is 608 00:36:23,600 --> 00:36:26,760 the verse and that's why it quotes the verse right here. 609 00:36:27,000 --> 00:36:30,880 And the other yellow about him Scripture says let not your 610 00:36:30,880 --> 00:36:36,160 mouth lead you into sin. So how does the Yurashami 611 00:36:36,320 --> 00:36:38,560 understand this verse in relation to Alicia? 612 00:36:38,600 --> 00:36:43,640 His mouth led him into sin by convincing these young students 613 00:36:43,640 --> 00:36:47,920 to abandon their Torah. And that was, that was that was 614 00:36:47,920 --> 00:36:51,760 something that he said and it was clearly very, very sinful. 615 00:36:52,280 --> 00:36:56,200 So that's why the Yurashami, you know, sort of splits up the 616 00:36:56,200 --> 00:36:59,240 Tosefta like it did. It quotes the first line of it, 617 00:36:59,720 --> 00:37:04,400 then it gives us story one, it then gives us story 2, and then 618 00:37:04,400 --> 00:37:06,920 it gets to the second part of the Tosefta to tell us that 619 00:37:06,920 --> 00:37:12,680 story two has now begun to incorporate both gazing and 620 00:37:12,680 --> 00:37:15,840 cutting the chutes and the mouth leading into sin. 621 00:37:16,320 --> 00:37:18,720 So this kind of weird scenario again comes from an 622 00:37:18,720 --> 00:37:22,960 interpretation of the Tosefta. You know, a different 1. 623 00:37:23,280 --> 00:37:25,600 The Yorushali presents these as cumulative. 624 00:37:25,640 --> 00:37:29,520 You know he did #1. Not only that, he also did #2, 625 00:37:29,920 --> 00:37:32,440 but again, I think we can understand these as two kind of 626 00:37:32,440 --> 00:37:35,160 independent attempts. Understand the Tosefta. 627 00:37:36,040 --> 00:37:38,840 OK, everybody with me so far that that's clear. 628 00:37:40,040 --> 00:37:41,960 Yes. OK, now the Yerushalmi 629 00:37:41,960 --> 00:37:43,800 continues. I couldn't fit it all in one 630 00:37:43,800 --> 00:37:47,840 slide, but you can see it's this is the continuation just 631 00:37:47,840 --> 00:37:51,840 starting again with that verse that we just read and the 632 00:37:51,840 --> 00:37:56,320 Yerushalmi continues for he destroys the works of that man. 633 00:37:57,200 --> 00:38:02,880 This is an interpretation of the last few words of the Tosefta. 634 00:38:04,240 --> 00:38:06,000 You see the verse ends. Sorry. 635 00:38:06,000 --> 00:38:08,080 The the verse quoted in the receptor. 636 00:38:08,080 --> 00:38:12,080 God may be angered by your talk and destroy the work of your 637 00:38:12,080 --> 00:38:14,240 hands. So the Yerushalmi says he 638 00:38:14,240 --> 00:38:16,640 destroyed the work of his the work. 639 00:38:17,280 --> 00:38:19,400 He destroyed the works of that man. 640 00:38:19,760 --> 00:38:21,600 Or the works of the hands of that man. 641 00:38:21,600 --> 00:38:26,080 I should have translated it, Masay Yadav shallow Tohai. 642 00:38:26,240 --> 00:38:29,560 In other words, he destroyed his own works of his hands. 643 00:38:29,560 --> 00:38:33,320 That man, the the Talmud, often talks about a person and the 644 00:38:33,320 --> 00:38:36,320 third person. Yeah, in the when it means the 645 00:38:36,320 --> 00:38:38,240 first person. So in other words, he destroyed 646 00:38:38,240 --> 00:38:42,280 his own works. Now, how did Alicia Benabuya 647 00:38:42,280 --> 00:38:45,720 destroy his own works or the work of his hands? 648 00:38:47,120 --> 00:38:51,560 Work of your hands is an idiom. It appears pretty often in the 649 00:38:51,560 --> 00:38:55,040 Torah and very often in rabbinic literature following its 650 00:38:55,160 --> 00:38:56,960 presence in the Torah and the rest of the Tanakh. 651 00:38:57,760 --> 00:38:59,120 And it can mean different things. 652 00:38:59,120 --> 00:39:00,920 One thing it can mean is children. 653 00:39:00,920 --> 00:39:04,640 Actually, the works of our hands are our children. 654 00:39:04,640 --> 00:39:07,680 I mean, that's the that's what we make as, as, you know, as 655 00:39:07,680 --> 00:39:09,920 adults and as parents. So it's. 656 00:39:09,920 --> 00:39:13,120 Possible it refers. That the Yurasami is saying 657 00:39:13,120 --> 00:39:15,760 here, you know, trying to understand the verse in terms of 658 00:39:15,760 --> 00:39:19,520 that scenario, that he destroyed these children, cut them off 659 00:39:19,520 --> 00:39:23,640 from Torah. But another another meaning of 660 00:39:23,800 --> 00:39:28,880 works of one's hands is meets, vote, the commandments. 661 00:39:28,880 --> 00:39:31,720 The good deeds that we do are the work of our hands. 662 00:39:32,400 --> 00:39:37,480 Masaya denu masaya die Masaya da masaya dekha, you know. 663 00:39:37,480 --> 00:39:41,200 So at least that's the way the rabbis often understand when the 664 00:39:41,200 --> 00:39:43,080 Bible talks about. Masaya da. 665 00:39:43,520 --> 00:39:48,160 So in other words, it seems like the Yerushami is understanding 666 00:39:48,160 --> 00:39:53,760 this part of the verse saying that Alicia, by this heinous 667 00:39:53,760 --> 00:39:56,720 act, by getting all these students to leave Torah, 668 00:39:56,720 --> 00:40:01,000 abandoned Torah, you know he destroyed the meets vote that 669 00:40:01,000 --> 00:40:05,480 were to his credit, you know he. Lost the merit of those meets 670 00:40:05,480 --> 00:40:08,800 vote or you know, again, maybe it's a double entendre. 671 00:40:08,800 --> 00:40:13,320 It also means he destroyed the children or cut the children off 672 00:40:13,320 --> 00:40:16,520 from Torah. That is the work of his. 673 00:40:16,520 --> 00:40:19,040 Hands or our hands? You know the work of people's 674 00:40:19,040 --> 00:40:22,440 hands is their children. So you know, it's a little bit 675 00:40:22,440 --> 00:40:25,640 of an awkward attempt, but I think again, the Yurasami is 676 00:40:25,640 --> 00:40:31,200 doing its best to understand why the Tosefta quotes this verse in 677 00:40:31,200 --> 00:40:33,880 relation to Alicia and what that might mean. 678 00:40:35,240 --> 00:40:40,480 But the Yurasami doesn't quite at least yet, you know, get deal 679 00:40:40,480 --> 00:40:44,320 with the rest of the verse. I mean, there's, you know, 680 00:40:44,320 --> 00:40:46,200 there's an. Angel or a mala? 681 00:40:46,280 --> 00:40:48,440 That it was an error. And God being angered by your 682 00:40:48,440 --> 00:40:50,200 talk, I mean, we don't quite see that. 683 00:40:50,760 --> 00:40:54,280 Interpreted yet, but they were somebody could be doing the best 684 00:40:54,280 --> 00:40:56,120 that it could, you know, Maybe not. 685 00:40:56,320 --> 00:40:59,240 Maybe it's not that every part of the verse is relevant, so 686 00:40:59,240 --> 00:41:01,680 that that's all part of story Two, right. 687 00:41:01,680 --> 00:41:06,160 So we've got two attempts to understand Alicia, one just 688 00:41:06,160 --> 00:41:10,800 taking into account the the phrase gazed and cut the shoots, 689 00:41:11,280 --> 00:41:15,200 and one that is the second one taking into account that phrase 690 00:41:15,720 --> 00:41:17,680 as well as two parts of the verse. 691 00:41:18,160 --> 00:41:20,920 Right, The mouth, leading him into sin and destroying the work 692 00:41:20,920 --> 00:41:24,760 of his hands. But now we get a third story in 693 00:41:24,760 --> 00:41:27,960 the Yerushalmi. This is a little more, a little 694 00:41:27,960 --> 00:41:30,720 more lengthy, right? So it says. 695 00:41:31,680 --> 00:41:37,360 Also when there was a persecution, they made them. 696 00:41:37,360 --> 00:41:42,200 They made the Jews carry burdens, but the Jews arranged 697 00:41:42,200 --> 00:41:44,400 to have two people carry one. Burden. 698 00:41:44,800 --> 00:41:49,800 On account of the rule that two who perform one labor on the 699 00:41:49,800 --> 00:41:53,560 Sabbath are not culpable. All right, so again, the Urshami 700 00:41:53,560 --> 00:42:00,160 is imagining a a situation where someone is persecuting the Jews. 701 00:42:00,160 --> 00:42:02,160 Let's say it's the Romans. I mean, we don't know because 702 00:42:02,160 --> 00:42:05,040 the Urshami doesn't tell us. And they're forcing Jews to 703 00:42:05,040 --> 00:42:07,320 violate Shabak. They're forcing Jews to carry 704 00:42:07,320 --> 00:42:09,760 things on Shabak. As we know, you're not allowed 705 00:42:09,760 --> 00:42:13,680 to carry from a private domain to a public domain, or a public 706 00:42:13,680 --> 00:42:16,840 domain to a private domain, or 4 cubits in a public domain. 707 00:42:18,280 --> 00:42:21,440 But the Jews are trying to outsmart these persecutors by 708 00:42:21,440 --> 00:42:24,960 having two people carry their load, whatever they're supposed 709 00:42:24,960 --> 00:42:27,080 to carry. Because if two people carry 710 00:42:27,080 --> 00:42:30,800 something, they don't violate Shabbat, at least not according 711 00:42:30,800 --> 00:42:33,320 to the right to law, the law of the Torah right. 712 00:42:33,320 --> 00:42:35,400 To do that, you have to carry. Something you have to. 713 00:42:35,400 --> 00:42:38,720 Perform a Shabbat labor individually, you know, by 714 00:42:38,720 --> 00:42:41,720 yourself, and then what happened? 715 00:42:41,760 --> 00:42:47,080 Alicia said. Make them carry individually, so 716 00:42:47,080 --> 00:42:49,840 they, the persecutors, went and made the Jews carry 717 00:42:49,840 --> 00:42:55,360 individually. So he's he's almost like he's 718 00:42:55,400 --> 00:42:59,800 he's basically turning his back on his people and he's he's 719 00:42:59,800 --> 00:43:02,840 going to the to the powers that be and saying oh if you really 720 00:43:02,840 --> 00:43:06,280 want to make them, you know if you really want to get at them 721 00:43:06,280 --> 00:43:08,440 this is what you have to do make them carried individually. 722 00:43:08,640 --> 00:43:12,080 So it's kind of like he's he's a traitor. 723 00:43:12,360 --> 00:43:14,720 Yes, exactly. I mean, the Yoshami is 724 00:43:15,360 --> 00:43:18,720 portraying him, like you say, as a traitor, as someone who's 725 00:43:19,080 --> 00:43:22,080 presumably apostasized, you know, renounced his religion, 726 00:43:22,080 --> 00:43:26,360 certainly renounced his people, not over to be some advisor for 727 00:43:26,840 --> 00:43:28,720 the Romans. Presumably I mean or. 728 00:43:28,880 --> 00:43:33,760 Some persecutors and telling them really how to, you know. 729 00:43:33,760 --> 00:43:36,280 Make the Jews. Violate their their own laws. 730 00:43:36,280 --> 00:43:38,200 You know, it's a terrible, terrible thing. 731 00:43:40,040 --> 00:43:42,400 So the story goes on. Unless we'll finish the story, 732 00:43:42,400 --> 00:43:43,760 then we'll come back to talk about it. 733 00:43:44,160 --> 00:43:47,600 But they arranged to set the burdens down in a Carmelite in 734 00:43:47,600 --> 00:43:50,520 order that they not carry out from a private domain to a 735 00:43:50,520 --> 00:43:53,320 public domain. So if you know Shabbat law, you 736 00:43:53,320 --> 00:43:57,160 know, a Carmelite is a kind of intermediate domain. 737 00:43:57,160 --> 00:43:59,920 It's neither public nor fully private. 738 00:43:59,920 --> 00:44:02,600 It's like the courtyard, you know? 739 00:44:04,080 --> 00:44:07,040 And again, you don't violate Shabbat law. 740 00:44:07,040 --> 00:44:09,400 Deal, right. At least according to the Torah, 741 00:44:10,000 --> 00:44:12,880 if you carry from a private domain to a Carmelite or a 742 00:44:12,880 --> 00:44:16,280 Carmelite to a private or public domain, it's only from a private 743 00:44:16,280 --> 00:44:19,000 domain to a public domain, or for cubits in the public domain. 744 00:44:19,160 --> 00:44:23,800 So again, the Jews were trying to outsmart the persecutors, or 745 00:44:23,800 --> 00:44:28,760 at least avoid the worst kinds of religious violations. 746 00:44:30,000 --> 00:44:32,680 Because after all, with the Romans with the persecutors knew 747 00:44:32,680 --> 00:44:35,600 know about this, you know, sort of detailed. 748 00:44:35,600 --> 00:44:38,600 Law about Shabbat boundaries and and domains. 749 00:44:38,600 --> 00:44:40,800 And so on. But then what happened? 750 00:44:40,840 --> 00:44:43,560 He said, Alicia said, make them carry flasks. 751 00:44:44,040 --> 00:44:47,880 So flasks are made out of glass. I mean, the Romans had kinds of 752 00:44:47,880 --> 00:44:53,440 glass or something very brittle, and they went and carried 753 00:44:53,440 --> 00:44:55,320 flasks. And the trouble with the flask 754 00:44:55,320 --> 00:44:57,800 is it probably couldn't be set down in a Carmel leap. 755 00:44:58,080 --> 00:45:03,320 So in other words, again, Alicia told the Romans how to get the 756 00:45:03,320 --> 00:45:08,640 Jews to violate Shabbat by, you know, in the most extreme way 757 00:45:09,000 --> 00:45:12,240 by. By making this loophole 758 00:45:12,240 --> 00:45:15,960 impossible, they they couldn't sit down flasks because the 759 00:45:15,960 --> 00:45:18,960 flasks would break. So they had to carry them from 760 00:45:18,960 --> 00:45:20,960 the private to the public domain. 761 00:45:21,200 --> 00:45:24,440 So again, Alicia, you know, is this advisor, this trader, this 762 00:45:24,440 --> 00:45:30,640 collaborator, you know, working with the persecutors now, it's a 763 00:45:30,720 --> 00:45:33,920 kind of odd scenario. You must, you know, kind of. 764 00:45:34,960 --> 00:45:37,480 We'd have to think like, you know. 765 00:45:41,280 --> 00:45:43,000 So where does the Yerushalmi get this? 766 00:45:43,040 --> 00:45:45,880 I mean, you know, again, it seems to be making this up, but 767 00:45:45,880 --> 00:45:47,440 why does it make up this scenario? 768 00:45:47,440 --> 00:45:51,600 How does this interpret the SO SEPTA or the verse? 769 00:45:52,720 --> 00:45:55,120 Well, again, it's kind of the. Mouth. 770 00:45:55,400 --> 00:45:59,640 Leading to sin. How does a mouth the mouth lead? 771 00:45:59,720 --> 00:46:01,680 To sin by telling them to carry the flasks. 772 00:46:01,840 --> 00:46:03,840 Exactly so. The mouth leads to sin. 773 00:46:03,880 --> 00:46:09,800 The map Alicia's mouth providing counsel to the persecutors leads 774 00:46:09,800 --> 00:46:13,760 the other Jews to sin because they have to violate Shabbat and 775 00:46:13,760 --> 00:46:17,040 it leads him to sin of course by you know, forcing others to 776 00:46:17,040 --> 00:46:19,840 violate Shabbat. So it lives up to that part of 777 00:46:19,840 --> 00:46:23,680 the verse and again destroy the work of your hands. 778 00:46:24,440 --> 00:46:27,720 I think again this is can be understood in terms of 779 00:46:27,720 --> 00:46:32,320 destroying meets vote, that is forcing the Jews to to break 780 00:46:32,720 --> 00:46:37,080 meets vote not observe Shabat. Maybe Alicia losing merit for 781 00:46:37,080 --> 00:46:38,360 his meets. Vote if. 782 00:46:38,800 --> 00:46:40,760 You know, work of your hands can refer to be smoked. 783 00:46:41,120 --> 00:46:44,200 But again, there's probably a double meaning here because the 784 00:46:44,200 --> 00:46:47,240 flasks would break if they were set down. 785 00:46:47,600 --> 00:46:51,960 So again it could be you know the destroying the work of your 786 00:46:51,960 --> 00:46:56,600 hands or breaking you know the work of your hands could be your 787 00:46:56,600 --> 00:46:59,520 son could be trying to understand that in terms of you 788 00:46:59,560 --> 00:47:01,400 know the the breaking of the flasks. 789 00:47:01,400 --> 00:47:05,360 You know it could have both meanings because it's a it's a 790 00:47:05,360 --> 00:47:09,800 very odd kind of scenario to to otherwise for the Yoshalmy to 791 00:47:09,800 --> 00:47:11,920 come up with it but wasn't trying really I think to 792 00:47:11,920 --> 00:47:14,720 understand how those verb, those words would apply. 793 00:47:15,880 --> 00:47:19,600 OK so Yoshalmy gives us, you know three stories, right. 794 00:47:19,600 --> 00:47:24,040 I mean killing the students, Not only that, but advising them to 795 00:47:24,040 --> 00:47:28,280 leave their studies and then this collaborating with the 796 00:47:28,280 --> 00:47:32,040 persecutors that it presents as he did this and he did this and 797 00:47:32,040 --> 00:47:34,800 he did that. But I think it's 3 attempts to 798 00:47:34,800 --> 00:47:36,760 understand the SOCEFTA. If you look carefully. 799 00:47:36,760 --> 00:47:41,280 The first one just interprets the first phrase in the Socefta 800 00:47:41,640 --> 00:47:44,720 gazed and cut the shoots right? Killing the students or seeing 801 00:47:44,720 --> 00:47:48,840 and killing the students. The second scenario interprets 802 00:47:48,840 --> 00:47:52,960 part of both that phrase gazed and cut, the shoots, the 803 00:47:52,960 --> 00:47:57,760 students abandoning Torah as well as your mouth leading you 804 00:47:57,760 --> 00:48:01,640 to sin because he told them to. Leave and I think this third one 805 00:48:01,640 --> 00:48:04,840 just interprets the verse. You know, does not really go 806 00:48:04,840 --> 00:48:07,600 back to the Tosefta gazed and cut the shoots. 807 00:48:08,120 --> 00:48:11,320 This third scenario about the Jews carrying burdens is just 808 00:48:11,320 --> 00:48:14,040 your mouth leading you to sin and destroying the work of your 809 00:48:14,040 --> 00:48:16,320 hands. So yer Shalmi is. 810 00:48:16,520 --> 00:48:19,560 I mean it's very brilliant here, you know, it's very 811 00:48:19,920 --> 00:48:21,760 aesthetically pleasing In a certain sense. 812 00:48:22,080 --> 00:48:28,080 It's making three attempts based on the two data that that you 813 00:48:28,080 --> 00:48:32,560 have in the Tosefta, gazed and cut the shoots and then the 814 00:48:32,560 --> 00:48:35,800 verse. The 1st just the gays didn't cut 815 00:48:35,800 --> 00:48:38,080 the shoots. The second verse both the 3rd 816 00:48:38,080 --> 00:48:40,560 just the verse. You know the Urshami saying, I'm 817 00:48:40,680 --> 00:48:44,240 I'm doing my best here working with the different components I 818 00:48:44,240 --> 00:48:46,040 have and this is what I come up with. 819 00:48:47,120 --> 00:48:50,880 It it's it's almost like in a sense, and I, you know, maybe 820 00:48:50,880 --> 00:48:54,280 there's a slight pun here, but it's almost like up until now, I 821 00:48:54,280 --> 00:48:56,760 know that it's going to get into Metatron, now we're going to get 822 00:48:56,760 --> 00:48:59,120 into that. But yeah, it seems like up until 823 00:48:59,120 --> 00:49:03,200 now, it's almost like they're demystifying it or just putting 824 00:49:03,200 --> 00:49:08,960 it into a a what's the word? It's it's kind of like just 825 00:49:08,960 --> 00:49:12,880 putting it, putting it into a context which which fits, you 826 00:49:12,880 --> 00:49:15,520 know, for for their audience in a way. 827 00:49:16,200 --> 00:49:17,480 Yeah, I mean that's that's funny. 828 00:49:17,560 --> 00:49:21,360 Judy isn't demystified. It's actually perfect for your 829 00:49:21,360 --> 00:49:23,760 title, 'cause This. It could be seen as a kind of 830 00:49:23,760 --> 00:49:29,880 demystification or, you know, suppressing whatever mystical 831 00:49:29,880 --> 00:49:33,360 element there was in the Tosefka and making it into something 832 00:49:33,360 --> 00:49:34,800 else. Yeah, making it something that 833 00:49:34,800 --> 00:49:36,920 maybe resonated. More with their audience. 834 00:49:39,320 --> 00:49:41,880 You know, they had some experience with persecution or 835 00:49:41,880 --> 00:49:45,440 they had some experience with, I don't know about people killing 836 00:49:45,440 --> 00:49:46,760 young students of Torah. I don't know. 837 00:49:46,840 --> 00:49:49,360 That would seem that would seem pretty extreme. 838 00:49:51,440 --> 00:49:54,000 But, but I think the the point I think we should come away with 839 00:49:54,080 --> 00:49:58,840 is that Yerushalmi generates these very, very negative 840 00:49:58,840 --> 00:50:04,280 portrayals of Alicia, not because it has biographical 841 00:50:04,280 --> 00:50:07,360 information, not because it's got some ancient tradition. 842 00:50:07,360 --> 00:50:09,600 About what he did. It's interpreted. 843 00:50:09,680 --> 00:50:15,760 Trying to interpret the Tosefta and in a way you can see this is 844 00:50:15,760 --> 00:50:17,960 a kind of Midrash. So remember what a Midrash or 845 00:50:17,960 --> 00:50:22,000 rabbinic Midrash will interpret a verse in the Torah, and very 846 00:50:22,000 --> 00:50:24,680 often not according to what we would call this the shot. 847 00:50:24,680 --> 00:50:26,400 Or it'll make sense of it in different ways. 848 00:50:26,680 --> 00:50:31,000 And especially the rabbinic kind of retellings of the biblical 849 00:50:31,000 --> 00:50:33,240 stories. You know, what happened with 850 00:50:33,240 --> 00:50:37,400 Cain and Abel and Cain and heaven and how they came to, you 851 00:50:37,440 --> 00:50:41,080 know, murder each other, or what happened with Abraham on the way 852 00:50:41,080 --> 00:50:42,920 to the Akeda. I mean, any of these rabbinic 853 00:50:42,920 --> 00:50:50,160 stories about biblical characters, these midrashim, you 854 00:50:50,160 --> 00:50:52,960 know, interpret what you have in the Bible in these different 855 00:50:52,960 --> 00:50:57,040 ways to generate new narratives, to generate new stories. 856 00:50:57,720 --> 00:51:03,360 And it's very unusual for rabbinic stories to be generated 857 00:51:03,400 --> 00:51:06,680 out of earlier rabbinic traditions as opposed to 858 00:51:07,040 --> 00:51:09,480 biblical tradition. But I think this is an. 859 00:51:09,480 --> 00:51:11,560 Example of it here. It's a kind of. 860 00:51:11,560 --> 00:51:17,720 Midrash on a rabbinic source. Not on a biblical source, but it 861 00:51:17,720 --> 00:51:19,480 but but it comes to the same thing. 862 00:51:20,000 --> 00:51:22,240 You know, telling us a new story about the characters. 863 00:51:24,680 --> 00:51:27,280 OK, so that's the Urshami. But you know, what's going to 864 00:51:27,280 --> 00:51:30,360 happen in in in later Jewish tradition is that people will 865 00:51:30,360 --> 00:51:34,200 start thinking this is what Alicia did, killed young 866 00:51:34,200 --> 00:51:36,760 students of Torah. He collaborated with the Romans, 867 00:51:37,040 --> 00:51:40,440 you know, and we get these kind of later traditions about trying 868 00:51:40,440 --> 00:51:43,720 to reconstruct what Alicia did, how he came to this. 869 00:51:45,240 --> 00:51:47,280 But you know, I think that's a little misguided. 870 00:51:48,920 --> 00:51:52,360 Because the Yorushami itself is just teasing out these scenarios 871 00:51:52,360 --> 00:51:53,560 to make sense of it. So, SEPTA. 872 00:51:53,560 --> 00:51:55,400 And it's not. It's obviously not saying that 873 00:51:55,400 --> 00:51:57,840 he literally killed them, but he's like cutting them off. 874 00:51:58,400 --> 00:52:01,200 Well, well, in the. In the in the first scenario he 875 00:52:01,200 --> 00:52:04,600 did kill them in in story one he would kill students of Torah. 876 00:52:05,000 --> 00:52:07,200 Yeah, and the second story is kind of walking it back a little 877 00:52:07,200 --> 00:52:09,080 bit. But he's not literally killing 878 00:52:09,080 --> 00:52:11,880 the students. He's he's just, you know, 879 00:52:12,200 --> 00:52:14,240 becoming a traitor and leading them astray. 880 00:52:14,720 --> 00:52:16,920 Yeah, it's a. It's a different a different 881 00:52:16,920 --> 00:52:19,480 attempt to understand the Tosefta source less. 882 00:52:20,440 --> 00:52:22,680 Kind of less terrible. Right. 883 00:52:22,960 --> 00:52:25,280 So meaning they're interpreting it, doesn't it? 884 00:52:25,440 --> 00:52:27,880 It it's not a matter of literal or not literal here, it's a 885 00:52:27,880 --> 00:52:31,720 matter of how are they going to interpret the words that they're 886 00:52:31,720 --> 00:52:33,920 trying to interpret. Yes, how are they going to make 887 00:52:33,920 --> 00:52:36,520 sense that that that's? What they're doing, yeah. 888 00:52:37,240 --> 00:52:38,880 Exactly. All right, so. 889 00:52:38,880 --> 00:52:40,000 Let's go to the Bob way. Good. 890 00:52:40,000 --> 00:52:43,000 We did the Ursami, Yeah. OK. 891 00:52:43,720 --> 00:52:45,680 Yeah. Hey, guys, What's me? 892 00:52:45,680 --> 00:52:47,040 Yeah. We're with you. 893 00:52:47,400 --> 00:52:50,720 OK, so here's the Bob Lee. So again, the Bob Lee appears in 894 00:52:50,880 --> 00:52:54,160 Traci Khagiya of the Bob Lee. It's also in the section of 895 00:52:54,160 --> 00:52:58,480 Talmud that interprets that Mishnah that we saw in the in 896 00:52:58,480 --> 00:53:00,360 the mission about the American bomb mysticism. 897 00:53:00,880 --> 00:53:03,000 And we get a. Story about the quotes The 898 00:53:03,000 --> 00:53:08,000 Tosefta, you know, Akhir gazed and cut the shoots and then it 899 00:53:08,000 --> 00:53:10,520 continues as follows. So what did he see? 900 00:53:12,120 --> 00:53:13,680 Right. What did Alicia see? 901 00:53:13,680 --> 00:53:16,080 Because what did the Joseph to see say? 902 00:53:16,360 --> 00:53:19,440 He gazed. Right now there are some 903 00:53:19,440 --> 00:53:21,160 manuscripts of the Talmud that doesn't that. 904 00:53:21,160 --> 00:53:23,720 Don't say what did he. See some of them actually just 905 00:53:23,720 --> 00:53:28,280 says what is this or what is Alicia, but and if you open your 906 00:53:28,280 --> 00:53:30,960 kind of printed text, the villainous shots that has you 907 00:53:31,440 --> 00:53:33,520 know. What was this? 908 00:53:33,520 --> 00:53:38,800 Or my he as opposed to my haza. What was he Or what is he as 909 00:53:38,800 --> 00:53:39,680 opposed to? What he saw. 910 00:53:39,920 --> 00:53:41,360 But I think this is the better reading. 911 00:53:41,400 --> 00:53:44,960 That is, the Babylonian Talmud is asking here, what does the 912 00:53:44,960 --> 00:53:49,560 Tosefta mean when it said Alicia gazed, you know, what did he 913 00:53:49,560 --> 00:53:51,280 see? OK, so now it tells us this 914 00:53:51,280 --> 00:53:54,160 story. He saw a Metatron. 915 00:53:54,160 --> 00:53:57,520 So Metatron is the name of an Angel that we know from various 916 00:53:57,520 --> 00:54:02,320 sources. He saw a Metatron to whom was 917 00:54:02,320 --> 00:54:07,600 given permission one hour each day to sit and write the merits 918 00:54:07,600 --> 00:54:10,560 of Israel. He said. 919 00:54:13,280 --> 00:54:17,320 It is taught that on high there is no standing and no sitting, 920 00:54:17,360 --> 00:54:21,960 and no jealousy, and no rivalry, and no back and no weariness. 921 00:54:22,040 --> 00:54:24,840 Perhaps, heaven forbid, there are two divine powers. 922 00:54:25,840 --> 00:54:28,640 Immediately they brought out Mephotron and struck him with 60 923 00:54:28,640 --> 00:54:33,040 lashes of fire. They said to him, when you saw 924 00:54:33,040 --> 00:54:36,400 him, what did? Why did you not rise before him? 925 00:54:36,920 --> 00:54:38,760 OK, this line I've put in angled. 926 00:54:38,760 --> 00:54:40,240 Brackets because it doesn't appear in all. 927 00:54:40,240 --> 00:54:42,520 Manuscripts, so they think the better reading has it. 928 00:54:42,800 --> 00:54:47,040 So they said to Metatron, when you saw Alicia, why did you not 929 00:54:47,040 --> 00:54:51,400 rise before him? He was given permission to burn 930 00:54:51,400 --> 00:54:55,800 the merits of Akher. Metatron was destroy the merits 931 00:54:55,800 --> 00:54:58,600 of Akher. A heavenly voice went out and 932 00:54:58,600 --> 00:55:03,600 said to him, return rebellious children, except for Akher. 933 00:55:07,200 --> 00:55:11,040 All right, so this is, you know, again a very tricky story. 934 00:55:11,720 --> 00:55:14,720 Let's try to understand it. What did he see? 935 00:55:15,360 --> 00:55:19,800 What did Alicia see? So he saw. 936 00:55:20,800 --> 00:55:24,040 He saw heavenly scribes sitting, which you're not supposed to be 937 00:55:24,040 --> 00:55:27,440 sitting if you are not God. That's right. 938 00:55:27,440 --> 00:55:30,120 So first of all, I think the thing first thing we should 939 00:55:30,120 --> 00:55:33,320 observe is the bodily presents. This in more of a mystical. 940 00:55:33,960 --> 00:55:36,680 Way. A little more consistent with 941 00:55:36,840 --> 00:55:40,720 hey, hello to Merkava mysticism because as we said, what what 942 00:55:40,720 --> 00:55:45,760 that kind of mysticism entailed was a heavenly journey, an out 943 00:55:45,760 --> 00:55:48,640 of body experience up to the heavenly realms where you saw 944 00:55:48,640 --> 00:55:51,040 these angels and you got to God's throne. 945 00:55:51,360 --> 00:55:54,640 So as opposed to the. Urshalmi the Bible is more 946 00:55:54,640 --> 00:55:59,520 consistent with understanding it as a kind of mysticism. 947 00:56:00,280 --> 00:56:03,000 So. The bodily assumes or is telling 948 00:56:03,000 --> 00:56:07,360 us that when he got up to heaven there he saw this Angel who was, 949 00:56:08,720 --> 00:56:12,080 you know, his function was like you said as a scribe to record 950 00:56:12,080 --> 00:56:16,080 the merits. These houyot right of Israel, 951 00:56:16,360 --> 00:56:19,160 you know of the Jews. So that on Yom Kippur for the 952 00:56:19,160 --> 00:56:22,560 nation as a whole we would have these merits to our credit. 953 00:56:23,240 --> 00:56:27,520 But Alicia got confused. He had some other tradition that 954 00:56:27,640 --> 00:56:31,560 up on high in heaven there's no standing or sitting, no 955 00:56:31,560 --> 00:56:35,320 jealousy, no rivalry, no back. Back refers to the backs of 956 00:56:35,320 --> 00:56:37,840 angels. According to some traditions You 957 00:56:37,840 --> 00:56:40,400 know the angels have heads on all. 958 00:56:40,400 --> 00:56:44,400 Sides or they're kind of face to face so you never see a back. 959 00:56:45,120 --> 00:56:47,480 There's no weariness, they never tie tie her out. 960 00:56:47,880 --> 00:56:52,520 But in in this tradition that he got from somewhere else, it says 961 00:56:52,520 --> 00:56:57,480 there's no sitting and Megatron is sitting so. 962 00:56:58,360 --> 00:57:02,640 Alicia reasons that an Angel can't be sitting because on 963 00:57:02,640 --> 00:57:05,600 high, no standing, no sitting, no jealousy means not. 964 00:57:05,600 --> 00:57:10,000 The angels can't do this. So Metrotron must be also 965 00:57:10,000 --> 00:57:13,720 divine, must be a divine figure, perhaps heaven forbid, their two 966 00:57:13,720 --> 00:57:18,200 divine powers. And you know, I think the bobbly 967 00:57:18,200 --> 00:57:21,920 here is sensitive also to what the rabbi's felt was a potential 968 00:57:21,920 --> 00:57:26,600 problem with mysticism with. This kind of esoteric inquiry 969 00:57:26,600 --> 00:57:28,800 into the heavenly realms as you might be LED astray. 970 00:57:28,800 --> 00:57:32,080 You might get some you know, come to some incorrect 971 00:57:32,080 --> 00:57:33,720 conclusion. Interesting. 972 00:57:33,720 --> 00:57:37,760 The interesting you know from my what I see here is that I've 973 00:57:37,760 --> 00:57:43,320 read some scholars also saying that this is potentially A 974 00:57:43,320 --> 00:57:49,080 cautionary tale about Gnosticism or dualism maybe even 975 00:57:49,080 --> 00:57:55,000 Christianity where he he kind of sees this lesser Yudke Vovke in 976 00:57:55,000 --> 00:57:58,720 in as as some capitalists describe and came to a 977 00:57:58,720 --> 00:58:02,320 conclusion that there is there are other forces other than God. 978 00:58:02,720 --> 00:58:06,280 So I think you're 100% right. I mean that's that's potentially 979 00:58:07,680 --> 00:58:10,920 in the background. There was this kind of religious 980 00:58:10,920 --> 00:58:16,280 movement that you, as you say, known as Gnosticism, which 981 00:58:16,320 --> 00:58:19,800 sometimes entailed. I mean, there were various kinds 982 00:58:19,800 --> 00:58:23,000 of Gnosticism, but a belief that there was a kind of higher God 983 00:58:23,000 --> 00:58:25,840 and a lower God, but there were two divine powers. 984 00:58:26,520 --> 00:58:31,640 Like it says here, you know, sometimes this is a good God and 985 00:58:31,640 --> 00:58:34,600 a bad God. I mean, this kind of dualism is, 986 00:58:34,600 --> 00:58:37,080 of course, a good way to understand why this world is 987 00:58:37,080 --> 00:58:40,200 evil and why they're suffering. We know in Babylonia 988 00:58:40,880 --> 00:58:43,520 Zoroastrians were dualists. So, you know, there's a lot of 989 00:58:43,560 --> 00:58:47,160 backgrounds here, but it could be that kind of, yeah, that kind 990 00:58:47,160 --> 00:58:50,560 of Gnosticism or mysticism. And the rabbis are kind of 991 00:58:50,560 --> 00:58:53,720 saying that's the danger. That is one of the dangers if 992 00:58:53,720 --> 00:58:55,560 you engage in this kind of mysticism. 993 00:58:56,040 --> 00:58:58,480 You know you might. Be LED astray by those heresies. 994 00:58:58,920 --> 00:59:02,520 As an interesting footnote, there's, you know, we see kind 995 00:59:02,520 --> 00:59:05,200 of modern day Bensey smiling 'cause he knows where I'm going 996 00:59:05,200 --> 00:59:07,520 with this. But we see kind of the modern 997 00:59:07,520 --> 00:59:12,320 day view of mysticism. The the Kabbalah of today kind 998 00:59:12,320 --> 00:59:15,560 of leads people to the same. In a way it could lead people to 999 00:59:15,560 --> 00:59:18,520 the same conclusion, not everybody, but that there are 1000 00:59:18,520 --> 00:59:23,600 different kind of expressions of the Godhead and. 1001 00:59:23,600 --> 00:59:26,640 Yeah, so Kabbalah, I mean that's why I say Kabbalah is different 1002 00:59:26,640 --> 00:59:28,200 than Hekolod America vamis distance. 1003 00:59:28,240 --> 00:59:30,880 Kabbalah understands God in terms in terms of tends to be 1004 00:59:30,880 --> 00:59:34,200 wrote. But those, you know Sphero also 1005 00:59:34,200 --> 00:59:37,520 do have these kind of different. Powers or Potencies. 1006 00:59:37,520 --> 00:59:40,880 So it's not quite the same as dualism or two divine powers. 1007 00:59:41,680 --> 00:59:44,200 But it's yeah, but that's that's similar. 1008 00:59:44,200 --> 00:59:47,240 Problems, Let's say beyond. Yeah, beyond, beyond the Sphero, 1009 00:59:47,240 --> 00:59:49,840 there's also the you know, there's the OX mode, and then 1010 00:59:49,840 --> 00:59:53,600 there's the Insof. And yeah, yeah, So, but yeah, 1011 00:59:53,640 --> 00:59:54,800 you're right. Right. 1012 00:59:54,800 --> 00:59:57,480 Which is for the same reason that it's considered mystical 1013 00:59:57,480 --> 01:00:00,440 and esoteric and shouldn't be engaged in by by everybody, 1014 01:00:00,520 --> 01:00:02,520 right. In any case, so let's go back to 1015 01:00:02,520 --> 01:00:07,080 our story. So, so, so Alicia says maybe 1016 01:00:07,080 --> 01:00:11,320 they're two divine powers. So what do they do? 1017 01:00:11,320 --> 01:00:14,160 They brought out Metatron and they they whipped him with 1018 01:00:14,160 --> 01:00:18,040 lashes of fire. So this proves to Alicia they're 1019 01:00:18,040 --> 01:00:23,200 not too divine powers, right? This was the way of convincing 1020 01:00:23,200 --> 01:00:28,080 him, demonstrating to him that Metatron's just an Angel. 1021 01:00:28,680 --> 01:00:32,400 You know he's not a God because he can be punished. 1022 01:00:32,560 --> 01:00:36,960 Like any subdivine figure. And and then this line they said 1023 01:00:36,960 --> 01:00:39,240 to him, when you saw him, why did you not rise before him? 1024 01:00:39,440 --> 01:00:41,600 This kind of blames Metatron a little bit. 1025 01:00:41,600 --> 01:00:44,600 You know, it was also a little bit Metatron's fault because 1026 01:00:44,600 --> 01:00:47,760 Metatron should have stood up and not let Alicia get the wrong 1027 01:00:47,760 --> 01:00:50,280 impression. So you could have that line or 1028 01:00:50,280 --> 01:00:53,760 you could not have the blind. But, but in any case, Alicia 1029 01:00:54,440 --> 01:01:01,040 caused Metatron to be punished, you know, to suffer in order to 1030 01:01:01,040 --> 01:01:03,760 prove that they were not too divine powers, because he had 1031 01:01:03,760 --> 01:01:07,280 articulated that very, very dangerous belief. 1032 01:01:08,240 --> 01:01:12,160 Now once Metatron is punished, he was given permission to burn 1033 01:01:12,160 --> 01:01:15,040 the merits of Ahir. So this is kind of a midaka 1034 01:01:15,040 --> 01:01:18,920 neged Midak, a measure for measure punishment. 1035 01:01:19,280 --> 01:01:21,560 Alicia caused Metatron to be punished. 1036 01:01:21,800 --> 01:01:25,160 So Metatron gets to take revenge and punish Ahir. 1037 01:01:25,560 --> 01:01:30,440 Metatron was struck with lashes of fire, so he gets to burn out 1038 01:01:30,960 --> 01:01:34,320 Akher's merits in return, and again, that seems to be his 1039 01:01:34,320 --> 01:01:36,320 function, right? He's described who was writing 1040 01:01:36,320 --> 01:01:39,600 the merits of Israel. So here he gets to erase or 1041 01:01:39,600 --> 01:01:45,120 destroy the merits of Akher of. Alicia, this this one Jew you 1042 01:01:45,160 --> 01:01:49,720 know. And once he's done that, Akher 1043 01:01:50,400 --> 01:01:53,560 Alicia loses all reward for meets vote, right? 1044 01:01:55,000 --> 01:02:00,400 He's lost all credit for meets, vote, and therefore what? 1045 01:02:00,400 --> 01:02:01,920 You know he can never get to heaven. 1046 01:02:02,880 --> 01:02:06,520 You know he's consigned to, you know, whether the rabbis think 1047 01:02:06,520 --> 01:02:09,720 you're going to go to Gehenna or hell or just to be destroyed, 1048 01:02:09,720 --> 01:02:11,960 you know he's not going to get to Alam haba. 1049 01:02:12,960 --> 01:02:16,080 And not only that, a heavenly voice went out and said to him, 1050 01:02:16,080 --> 01:02:20,760 return rebellious children. Except Akhir, right? 1051 01:02:20,760 --> 01:02:24,800 It's a quote from a verse near Miyahu and Jeremiah Shuvu, Banim 1052 01:02:24,800 --> 01:02:27,440 Shuvavim. Everybody can do chuvo, right? 1053 01:02:27,440 --> 01:02:30,160 We know all Jews can do chuvo. We're supposed to do chuvo every 1054 01:02:30,160 --> 01:02:33,440 year on Yom Kippur every day, and that's how you get rid of 1055 01:02:33,440 --> 01:02:37,360 sin. But if Alicia can't do chuva, 1056 01:02:38,160 --> 01:02:43,560 he's stuck. He's got no merits and he can't 1057 01:02:43,560 --> 01:02:47,120 do chuvo for his sins. So at the end of the day, he's 1058 01:02:47,120 --> 01:02:52,320 going to be a Russia and there's no way for him to escape that 1059 01:02:52,320 --> 01:02:55,080 fate, no way for him to get to Alam Haba, he. 1060 01:02:55,480 --> 01:02:57,840 Has no incentive to improve because. 1061 01:02:57,920 --> 01:02:59,280 That's right. So the story is going to 1062 01:02:59,280 --> 01:03:01,400 continue with him doing evil and so on. 1063 01:03:01,400 --> 01:03:04,960 We'll get to that in a minute because after all, he's he's got 1064 01:03:04,960 --> 01:03:07,440 no, you know, he's got no options, he's got no reason to 1065 01:03:07,440 --> 01:03:09,360 be good. He's got no reason to be mitzvot 1066 01:03:09,480 --> 01:03:13,600 to mitzvot anymore because they're all burnt out and he 1067 01:03:13,600 --> 01:03:17,880 can't do shuba. And we'll just look at the next 1068 01:03:17,880 --> 01:03:20,240 scene of the story, 'cause it's important for understanding the 1069 01:03:20,240 --> 01:03:26,800 CEFTA 2 and then we'll we'll go back to the CEFTA, so the story 1070 01:03:26,800 --> 01:03:31,080 of the bobbly continues he. Said that as Alicia said, since 1071 01:03:31,080 --> 01:03:34,560 that man, that is since I again the 3rd for the first person. 1072 01:03:35,000 --> 01:03:37,480 Since that man has been banished from that world. 1073 01:03:37,640 --> 01:03:40,080 I will go and enjoy myself in this world. 1074 01:03:40,320 --> 01:03:42,160 I've got no way to get to a Llama BA. 1075 01:03:43,240 --> 01:03:45,280 No merits, no ability to do Chuva. 1076 01:03:45,280 --> 01:03:47,640 So why should I do meets vote. Why should I be good in this 1077 01:03:47,640 --> 01:03:49,440 world? I'll go be ahead in this. 1078 01:03:49,480 --> 01:03:53,440 You know I might as well. And Arthur went out to evil 1079 01:03:53,440 --> 01:03:57,080 ways. Literally evil growth Targoutra. 1080 01:03:58,520 --> 01:04:00,440 I think it's important it uses this term. 1081 01:04:00,440 --> 01:04:04,720 It's not the most common term, but why would it be evil growth 1082 01:04:11,120 --> 01:04:13,040 going back to? The yeah is this. 1083 01:04:13,200 --> 01:04:15,760 Is this part of the shoots? Yeah, so this is going back to 1084 01:04:15,760 --> 01:04:19,960 the shoots will be. So he went out to evil growths 1085 01:04:20,000 --> 01:04:22,320 evil ways. In modern Hebrew the words are 1086 01:04:22,320 --> 01:04:25,360 boot means culture, but in the in the in Rabbinic Hebrew it 1087 01:04:25,360 --> 01:04:30,320 means you know it means growth. So he went out to evil growth. 1088 01:04:30,360 --> 01:04:34,720 He found a certain prostitute. He propositioned her. 1089 01:04:35,880 --> 01:04:38,040 She said to him. Are you not Alicia Benabuya, 1090 01:04:38,040 --> 01:04:39,560 whose name went out throughout the world? 1091 01:04:39,560 --> 01:04:41,680 Aren't you the famous sage Alicia Benabuya? 1092 01:04:41,920 --> 01:04:43,560 Everybody's heard of this great sage. 1093 01:04:43,560 --> 01:04:46,480 Why are you propositioning me a prostitute? 1094 01:04:47,440 --> 01:04:50,160 He uprooted a radish. On the Sabbath and gave it to 1095 01:04:50,200 --> 01:04:52,560 her. Uproot are we? 1096 01:04:52,800 --> 01:04:55,920 Is the uproot thing maybe another kind of? 1097 01:04:56,320 --> 01:04:59,000 Could be, could be another cutting the shoots. 1098 01:04:59,240 --> 01:05:01,120 Another cutting. The shoots are like, a little. 1099 01:05:01,120 --> 01:05:04,040 Yeah, OK. And then she said, it's another 1100 01:05:04,040 --> 01:05:05,480 right? It is Akher. 1101 01:05:05,560 --> 01:05:08,720 It can't be Alicia Benabuya, because Alicia Benabuya would 1102 01:05:08,720 --> 01:05:12,280 not violate Shabbat if you uproot a plant, right? 1103 01:05:12,600 --> 01:05:15,680 It's the kind of gardening, it's it's forbidden on the Sabbath. 1104 01:05:16,040 --> 01:05:22,400 So he proves to her that that he is not, it's not Alicia. 1105 01:05:22,560 --> 01:05:24,560 And then she says, oh, it's another Akher. 1106 01:05:24,760 --> 01:05:27,520 So here we get a kind of ideology and origin of the name 1107 01:05:27,520 --> 01:05:29,760 Akher. How did he get the name Akher? 1108 01:05:30,120 --> 01:05:32,440 You know, this prostitute said, oh, you're you're another 1109 01:05:32,440 --> 01:05:34,280 person, you're not Alicia Benabuja. 1110 01:05:34,280 --> 01:05:39,240 So that's that's how we got the sobriquet or the nickname of 1111 01:05:39,400 --> 01:05:42,000 Akhir. So professor, when you look at 1112 01:05:42,000 --> 01:05:47,120 this, it's so interesting. We have here 2 interpretations. 1113 01:05:47,120 --> 01:05:48,880 We have the interpretations of the Yoshami. 1114 01:05:48,880 --> 01:05:52,360 We have the interpretations of the Paasley completely 1115 01:05:52,360 --> 01:05:54,240 different. Completely different. 1116 01:05:54,240 --> 01:05:58,560 Because even even like, there's nothing that you can compare 1117 01:05:58,560 --> 01:05:59,720 them. It's just it's meaning like 1118 01:06:00,080 --> 01:06:02,320 completely two different distinct directions. 1119 01:06:02,960 --> 01:06:05,840 Yeah, you're right, because neither of them really 1120 01:06:05,840 --> 01:06:10,600 understood the Tosefta. And so they they they made the 1121 01:06:10,600 --> 01:06:14,280 best they could to to make sense of it and you know, they went in 1122 01:06:14,280 --> 01:06:17,200 certain directions. We will see a little later. 1123 01:06:17,200 --> 01:06:20,320 When we do the other podcast about the Ursami and the badly. 1124 01:06:20,840 --> 01:06:23,080 There is something in common between the two. 1125 01:06:23,080 --> 01:06:25,560 They did have a kind of shared tradition, but but not really in 1126 01:06:25,560 --> 01:06:28,840 this section. OK, but so you make a a good 1127 01:06:28,840 --> 01:06:30,440 observation. You know it's like two different 1128 01:06:30,440 --> 01:06:31,800 midrashim, right? You can. 1129 01:06:31,800 --> 01:06:33,480 Interpret A. Biblical verse. 1130 01:06:33,480 --> 01:06:36,360 So, so it's it's just it's interesting to me that when 1131 01:06:36,360 --> 01:06:41,120 people want to take these for what it's worth historically it 1132 01:06:41,160 --> 01:06:43,600 it becomes it's you know like what do you. 1133 01:06:43,880 --> 01:06:47,800 So because the Bavli was more popularized, so the Bavli, the 1134 01:06:47,800 --> 01:06:51,440 Bavli version kind of got popularized. 1135 01:06:51,440 --> 01:06:54,400 So then that's what happened and you know, but if you look into 1136 01:06:54,400 --> 01:06:57,840 your Xiaomi it's it's not at all what happened, but that's OK 1137 01:06:57,840 --> 01:07:00,040 because it just never gained as much popularity. 1138 01:07:00,360 --> 01:07:03,040 I mean, that's really where it's how it's ended up. 1139 01:07:03,400 --> 01:07:07,400 And you also mentioned in your in the previous podcast we did 1140 01:07:07,400 --> 01:07:11,400 with you about the different gear Saut and the you know we're 1141 01:07:11,400 --> 01:07:14,600 not supposed to look at these things historically because you 1142 01:07:14,600 --> 01:07:18,400 see that each version is trying to teach like a different 1143 01:07:18,400 --> 01:07:19,840 lesson. You should learn all of them and 1144 01:07:19,840 --> 01:07:22,360 try to understand all trying to tell us because for example the 1145 01:07:22,360 --> 01:07:25,040 Bob Lee will use the backdrop of like a Bait me Josh where it 1146 01:07:25,040 --> 01:07:31,040 wasn't originally because that was their their culture so so I 1147 01:07:31,040 --> 01:07:32,200 think that's that's important to. 1148 01:07:32,200 --> 01:07:34,680 Point out 100%. In other words, any rabbinic 1149 01:07:34,680 --> 01:07:37,880 story, rabbinic stories about Rabbi Akiba, rabbinic stories 1150 01:07:37,880 --> 01:07:40,680 about Rabbi May, or all those rabbinic traditions, as we 1151 01:07:40,680 --> 01:07:43,920 explained before, are not meant to be historical or 1152 01:07:43,920 --> 01:07:46,920 biographical. They're closer to what we would 1153 01:07:46,920 --> 01:07:51,280 call didactic fiction, you know, with the asterisk that fiction, 1154 01:07:51,280 --> 01:07:55,240 history, biography, and antiquity did not exist in 1155 01:07:55,240 --> 01:07:58,360 exactly the same way that we conceptualize them today. 1156 01:07:59,280 --> 01:08:02,200 But so any Ribbinic story, even the ones about Ribbin, you know, 1157 01:08:02,200 --> 01:08:04,400 should not be understood historically, biographically, 1158 01:08:04,680 --> 01:08:07,920 but, you know, call the Homer. This one because these ones we 1159 01:08:07,920 --> 01:08:10,400 see exactly where they come from, and they come from 1160 01:08:10,400 --> 01:08:12,200 interpretation of an earlier source. 1161 01:08:12,200 --> 01:08:14,320 You know the others. And some of the other ones, we 1162 01:08:14,320 --> 01:08:15,720 don't know exactly where they come from. 1163 01:08:16,000 --> 01:08:18,439 Sometimes we do. Here we see clearly that there's 1164 01:08:18,479 --> 01:08:20,760 a Tosefta. Here we see clearly there's a 1165 01:08:20,760 --> 01:08:24,840 Tosefta, and we see clearly that the babbling Nyushalmi are 1166 01:08:24,840 --> 01:08:27,560 trying to interpret over here. It's clear as day. 1167 01:08:27,600 --> 01:08:28,960 I understand. So there. 1168 01:08:28,960 --> 01:08:31,640 Is any historical or biographical kernel. 1169 01:08:31,640 --> 01:08:34,120 It's in the Tosefta, but you know, even that we should 1170 01:08:34,120 --> 01:08:37,000 understand is probably a later tradition and meant to tell a 1171 01:08:37,000 --> 01:08:39,840 lesson about this kind of mystical speculation. 1172 01:08:39,840 --> 01:08:41,960 You know, even the Tosefta is far removed. 1173 01:08:42,560 --> 01:08:46,560 From the original Alicia, you know, we just have no idea, but 1174 01:08:46,560 --> 01:08:50,279 certainly you know 100% the bobbly in your shop. 1175 01:08:50,720 --> 01:08:54,439 Alicia Benabuya is basically the archetype for teaching this. 1176 01:08:54,600 --> 01:09:00,880 It's a tool to teach a specific lesson about apostasy or heresy. 1177 01:09:01,080 --> 01:09:02,520 Exactly. And actually, we'll see the 1178 01:09:02,520 --> 01:09:04,920 Bobbly is going to use it. Really, for teaching a different 1179 01:09:04,920 --> 01:09:07,600 lesson and your shop, you're teaching different lessons. 1180 01:09:08,000 --> 01:09:09,600 But it does exactly become a tool. 1181 01:09:09,840 --> 01:09:12,960 For right, Benji's words would hold for the Tosefta. 1182 01:09:14,479 --> 01:09:18,000 Well. It's yeah, the Tosefta does 1183 01:09:18,000 --> 01:09:21,040 teach that there's a danger in mystical speculation, but again, 1184 01:09:21,040 --> 01:09:22,479 it doesn't tell us really that much about. 1185 01:09:22,600 --> 01:09:24,880 What it really is possible? But once you get into the 1186 01:09:24,880 --> 01:09:27,040 bottling, like what what comes like, you know, all the stories 1187 01:09:27,040 --> 01:09:29,439 that start following it goes in a completely different 1188 01:09:29,439 --> 01:09:30,840 direction. It's not even discussing 1189 01:09:30,840 --> 01:09:32,920 mysticism. It's it's, it's right. 1190 01:09:32,920 --> 01:09:34,880 It's, it's, it's going to start. Posing completely different 1191 01:09:34,880 --> 01:09:36,399 questions. Exactly, exactly. 1192 01:09:36,479 --> 01:09:38,600 We'll get to that. Let's just look again what I 1193 01:09:38,600 --> 01:09:40,560 want to make one thing clear. We'll we'll get back to that 1194 01:09:40,560 --> 01:09:42,840 other slide. But so in other words, we can 1195 01:09:42,840 --> 01:09:45,760 see how the bobly interprets the Tosefta. 1196 01:09:45,760 --> 01:09:47,560 If you look at these two columns, right. 1197 01:09:47,960 --> 01:09:53,120 So the Tosefta says Alicia gazed and cut the chute. 1198 01:09:53,120 --> 01:09:55,520 So in the bobly, what is the gaze? 1199 01:09:55,520 --> 01:09:57,480 Well, and it says it opens. What did he? 1200 01:09:57,480 --> 01:10:01,800 See. He saw Mechatron cut the chutes, 1201 01:10:01,800 --> 01:10:04,280 as you guys already correctly figured out. 1202 01:10:05,000 --> 01:10:10,440 The Bobly understands is went out to evil ways or growth, went 1203 01:10:10,440 --> 01:10:13,400 out to evil growth and then uprooted the radish. 1204 01:10:13,400 --> 01:10:17,040 Those are both attempts to interpret the toseft as cutting 1205 01:10:17,040 --> 01:10:19,560 the chutes. How did his mouth lead him into 1206 01:10:19,560 --> 01:10:22,040 sin? He said Perhaps they're 2 1207 01:10:22,040 --> 01:10:25,560 powers, right? He he voiced or articulated this 1208 01:10:25,560 --> 01:10:30,880 heretical dualistic speculation. So that was a mouth articulating 1209 01:10:30,920 --> 01:10:34,400 A theological sin. You might say the Angel or 1210 01:10:34,400 --> 01:10:36,880 malach in the verse is clearly Metatron. 1211 01:10:36,920 --> 01:10:38,480 You know, we didn't get that in your Shalmi. 1212 01:10:38,480 --> 01:10:41,840 The Bahui's doing a better job, if you ask me, of interpreting 1213 01:10:42,160 --> 01:10:46,560 all the data that it has in the Tosefta, do not say before the 1214 01:10:46,560 --> 01:10:49,680 malach that it was an error. I think that's being interpreted 1215 01:10:49,680 --> 01:10:53,880 as, you know, do not repent. In other words, you akher cannot 1216 01:10:53,880 --> 01:10:57,520 say, oh, I made a mistake, Let me do Chuva. 1217 01:10:58,520 --> 01:10:59,760 No. You can't. 1218 01:11:00,320 --> 01:11:05,320 You can't repent. No God being angered in the in 1219 01:11:05,320 --> 01:11:08,600 the verse is being is Metatron being punished. 1220 01:11:08,600 --> 01:11:13,040 You know he was angry at Metatron or I guess you could 1221 01:11:13,040 --> 01:11:17,040 say angry at Alicia too by his talk. 1222 01:11:17,040 --> 01:11:19,560 Again the talk is the mouth leading him into sin. 1223 01:11:19,560 --> 01:11:22,880 Perhaps there are two powers and destroy the work of your hands. 1224 01:11:22,880 --> 01:11:26,680 As we said Masaya Dekha. Masaya daf work of your hands 1225 01:11:27,160 --> 01:11:30,600 often refers to meets vote or the merit of meets vote. 1226 01:11:31,200 --> 01:11:35,320 So how did the work of Alicia's hands get destroyed? 1227 01:11:35,760 --> 01:11:40,960 His merits, his cuyote, the mixed vote he did were destroyed 1228 01:11:40,960 --> 01:11:44,800 by Mechatron. So almost everything in the 1229 01:11:44,800 --> 01:11:49,400 Tosefta and the verse from Cohelate that is quoted gets 1230 01:11:49,400 --> 01:11:54,440 interpreted in the Bobly to create this kind of scenario. 1231 01:11:54,760 --> 01:11:56,080 The Bobly really does a great job. 1232 01:11:56,080 --> 01:11:59,560 Here I have to say. May I may I say that you're 1233 01:11:59,600 --> 01:12:01,720 you're you're mentioning that the Bawi does a better job. 1234 01:12:01,800 --> 01:12:06,320 I'm wondering if, see, there's an intuitive notion over here 1235 01:12:06,320 --> 01:12:10,440 with the Bawi because it's it's it's talking more to the point 1236 01:12:10,440 --> 01:12:13,560 of the of the Tosefta, which is the mystical experience, which 1237 01:12:13,560 --> 01:12:16,360 is right that I think that's why you're saying it's doing a 1238 01:12:16,400 --> 01:12:19,400 better job. So, well, better job 'cause it's 1239 01:12:20,160 --> 01:12:23,160 it's, it's consistent with that mystical background. 1240 01:12:23,480 --> 01:12:27,480 And also 'cause it, it takes into account more of the verse 1241 01:12:28,120 --> 01:12:30,720 and the Tosefta. Right, right. 1242 01:12:30,720 --> 01:12:33,640 The Yoshami, what it did with the verse is really out there. 1243 01:12:33,640 --> 01:12:34,320 I hear you. Yeah. 1244 01:12:34,720 --> 01:12:36,400 Yeah, yeah. The Yoshami took into account 1245 01:12:36,400 --> 01:12:38,520 parts of the verse, but we'll look at that in a minute. 1246 01:12:38,520 --> 01:12:42,240 But dropped, but dropped the stuff about Metatron or an 1247 01:12:42,240 --> 01:12:43,920 Angel? No Angel appeared in the 1248 01:12:43,920 --> 01:12:47,040 Yoshami. So I'm wondering if the if the 1249 01:12:47,160 --> 01:12:53,680 because in general, as a whole the Yoshami tends to be again 1250 01:12:54,720 --> 01:12:59,400 pun intended I guess, but sort of demystified as opposed to the 1251 01:12:59,400 --> 01:13:01,520 Bavli. The Yoshami doesn't talk about 1252 01:13:01,520 --> 01:13:03,120 demons much. The Yoshami doesn't. 1253 01:13:03,360 --> 01:13:07,360 The Yoshami doesn't seem interested so much in, you know 1254 01:13:07,640 --> 01:13:11,640 mystical speculation as much as the Bavli which which you'll see 1255 01:13:11,640 --> 01:13:13,640 a lot of shades in, you'll see a lot of angels. 1256 01:13:13,960 --> 01:13:18,880 So I'm wondering if kind of like the character of of the 1257 01:13:18,880 --> 01:13:23,440 Babylonians of the Bavli and the character of the Yoshami 1258 01:13:23,440 --> 01:13:26,880 contributed to their way of interpreting. 1259 01:13:27,400 --> 01:13:29,640 Yeah, it's possible. I mean, it's very possible. 1260 01:13:30,800 --> 01:13:35,040 I think this notion that the Ursami doesn't have as many 1261 01:13:35,040 --> 01:13:38,560 angels and demons as the Bobly might be a little exaggerated. 1262 01:13:38,880 --> 01:13:41,720 There's definitely less in the Ursami, but the Ursami is a 1263 01:13:41,720 --> 01:13:44,640 shorter text. You know this? 1264 01:13:44,760 --> 01:13:48,000 This, I think this goes back to the scholar Lewis Ginsburg who 1265 01:13:48,000 --> 01:13:50,840 was trying in a famous essay was trying to explain differences 1266 01:13:50,840 --> 01:13:52,840 between the Bob and urshami. There are a lot of. 1267 01:13:52,840 --> 01:13:55,400 Demons that appear in the. Urshami maybe they're more in 1268 01:13:55,400 --> 01:13:57,760 the bodily cause. Babylonia, you know, and 1269 01:13:57,760 --> 01:14:01,080 Zoroastrianism and Persian, Iranian culture, they they 1270 01:14:01,080 --> 01:14:03,080 thought more about demons. But there's definitely in the 1271 01:14:03,080 --> 01:14:04,920 Urshami. Everybody in antiquity believed 1272 01:14:04,920 --> 01:14:08,520 in demons and angels. It might be there's less of the 1273 01:14:08,520 --> 01:14:11,880 mystical speculation in the in the Urushami it might be the 1274 01:14:11,880 --> 01:14:15,680 bodily continued the hello traditions a little more 1275 01:14:15,680 --> 01:14:19,720 although I think we have texts from arits Israel about them so 1276 01:14:19,760 --> 01:14:21,480 it it's possible what you're saying is true. 1277 01:14:21,480 --> 01:14:22,760 I'm I'm. I'm just not sure. 1278 01:14:22,800 --> 01:14:24,600 I'm just not sure. Fair, Fair. 1279 01:14:24,880 --> 01:14:25,560 It could be. I'm wrong. 1280 01:14:25,640 --> 01:14:26,920 I I'm not. No exponential. 1281 01:14:26,920 --> 01:14:29,120 I mean, I know you could. I heard these ideas floating 1282 01:14:29,120 --> 01:14:30,520 around, so I was kind of just bringing it up. 1283 01:14:30,520 --> 01:14:32,360 But you're much more familiar than me. 1284 01:14:32,400 --> 01:14:34,960 I'll take your word for it. Yeah, and one thing that's 1285 01:14:34,960 --> 01:14:38,720 standing out to me, obviously is like, it's really jumping out at 1286 01:14:38,720 --> 01:14:40,640 me is the whole prostitute narrative. 1287 01:14:41,240 --> 01:14:43,800 Yeah. Well, again, that that that 1288 01:14:43,800 --> 01:14:46,480 prostitute marriage is prostitute. 1289 01:14:46,760 --> 01:14:51,200 Narrative is funny because it might even be a kind of comical 1290 01:14:51,200 --> 01:14:54,920 element in it, but it's the Bodley's understanding of what 1291 01:14:54,920 --> 01:14:58,920 someone would do who's got no motivation to be a good person. 1292 01:14:59,600 --> 01:15:02,120 Why would you not just try to enjoy yourself, pleasure 1293 01:15:02,120 --> 01:15:04,520 yourself eating, drinking? Why would you observe me? 1294 01:15:04,560 --> 01:15:06,920 So why would you observe the sexual prohibitions? 1295 01:15:07,720 --> 01:15:10,120 So the Bodley, you know, kind of. 1296 01:15:11,240 --> 01:15:13,800 Almost logically, I mean, there's some, you know, there's 1297 01:15:13,920 --> 01:15:17,480 some kind of reason to this. You know, if you if you think 1298 01:15:17,480 --> 01:15:21,880 there's no nothing to work for, you've got no chance of getting 1299 01:15:21,880 --> 01:15:24,280 any sort of heavenly reward, so. Yeah, you might. 1300 01:15:24,480 --> 01:15:26,840 You might go out and. And and be ahead in this. 1301 01:15:27,080 --> 01:15:30,320 SO11 interesting observation is that you know in the ancient 1302 01:15:30,320 --> 01:15:34,880 world especially prostitutes were kind of like this shows 1303 01:15:34,880 --> 01:15:37,280 that prostitutes actually new stuff like here she's even she 1304 01:15:37,280 --> 01:15:41,400 knows like Kalaha she knows who she knows who is Why because 1305 01:15:41,800 --> 01:15:44,800 because people would who would go visit prostitutes they they 1306 01:15:44,800 --> 01:15:46,960 would talk they would speak to them they would tell them. 1307 01:15:46,960 --> 01:15:48,640 Stuff. I think you're being a little 1308 01:15:48,640 --> 01:15:53,520 more, a little too historical. I think this is this is the 1309 01:15:53,520 --> 01:15:58,240 bobly imagining a kind of prostitute who's knowledgeable 1310 01:15:58,240 --> 01:16:00,320 about Jewish law. But again, it's for the purpose. 1311 01:16:00,320 --> 01:16:03,160 Of no, it's it's it's just funny that he, he, it's interesting 1312 01:16:03,360 --> 01:16:06,280 that he goes to a prostitute and is having this conversation like 1313 01:16:06,280 --> 01:16:09,960 he propositions her, like, yeah, you have to do anything. 1314 01:16:09,960 --> 01:16:12,720 It's strange. Yeah, well, he propositioned her 1315 01:16:12,720 --> 01:16:15,880 as the typical bobly phrase for what you say to a prostitute. 1316 01:16:15,920 --> 01:16:21,360 You know, it's like, but but yeah, but the whole scene is 1317 01:16:21,360 --> 01:16:26,720 really to prove, to provide the explanation of of, of cutting 1318 01:16:26,720 --> 01:16:30,480 the shoots, uprooting the radish and then getting the name Akhir 1319 01:16:30,480 --> 01:16:32,200 because the prostitute thinks it's the other it. 1320 01:16:32,600 --> 01:16:35,680 Also, just to segue the name. It shows what kind of company 1321 01:16:35,680 --> 01:16:38,400 he's keeping meaning that's how far down he's gone that he's. 1322 01:16:38,400 --> 01:16:41,440 With Yeah, exactly. OK all. 1323 01:16:41,440 --> 01:16:42,640 Right, I want to do. I want to do. 1324 01:16:42,640 --> 01:16:48,640 One other thing here, you're going to have to reorder the cut 1325 01:16:48,640 --> 01:16:51,000 and paste. Is that OK in your editing? 1326 01:16:51,720 --> 01:16:52,800 It's OK. Yeah. 1327 01:16:52,840 --> 01:16:56,200 'Cause I I forgot to do this. With the Urushami so. 1328 01:16:58,320 --> 01:16:59,960 You can even go back. It doesn't have to be cut and 1329 01:16:59,960 --> 01:17:01,400 paste. We'll just keep this in. 1330 01:17:01,400 --> 01:17:05,520 It's fine. Yeah, no, yeah. 1331 01:17:05,520 --> 01:17:10,240 So here again so let's pretend you know we're we're we're we're 1332 01:17:10,240 --> 01:17:14,000 just dealing with the Urushami. So, so let's let's just review 1333 01:17:14,000 --> 01:17:17,880 the Urushami and illustrate how the Urushami understands and so 1334 01:17:17,880 --> 01:17:21,080 SEPTA and the verse that it quotes. 1335 01:17:21,080 --> 01:17:24,400 So again this is to make clear just how the Yuoshami is 1336 01:17:24,400 --> 01:17:27,640 interpreting the SEPTA. Where the Tosefta says gaze, the 1337 01:17:27,640 --> 01:17:30,840 Yuoshami says you would kill every student to be saw 1338 01:17:31,320 --> 01:17:35,200 distinguish himself in Torah. Cutting the shoots the Yuoshami 1339 01:17:35,200 --> 01:17:38,320 understands as killing the young students of Torah. 1340 01:17:38,760 --> 01:17:42,120 I should also say also cutting, cutting them off from Torah, 1341 01:17:42,120 --> 01:17:44,760 that is telling them to abandon the Torah. 1342 01:17:45,560 --> 01:17:49,680 Letting your mouth lead you into sin is in that third story, in 1343 01:17:49,680 --> 01:17:51,240 the second. Story where he says. 1344 01:17:51,720 --> 01:17:55,080 Now what are they doing here? The students should go away, and 1345 01:17:55,080 --> 01:17:59,000 in the third story, it's where he tells the persecutors make 1346 01:17:59,000 --> 01:18:02,200 them carry individually to violate Shabbat, not two at a 1347 01:18:02,200 --> 01:18:05,040 time. Or make them carry flasks which 1348 01:18:05,040 --> 01:18:07,880 they can't sit down. Now it doesn't seem that the 1349 01:18:07,880 --> 01:18:10,600 Yershami interprets those other parts of the verse. 1350 01:18:10,760 --> 01:18:13,000 I mean, it's OK that Yershami could have thought it was only 1351 01:18:13,000 --> 01:18:16,760 the first part of the verse that was relevant to the 1st and the 1352 01:18:16,760 --> 01:18:17,480 last. Part. 1353 01:18:19,480 --> 01:18:23,400 And then God may be angered by your talk as above. 1354 01:18:23,400 --> 01:18:26,240 That's him saying, you know, saying those things. 1355 01:18:29,520 --> 01:18:32,840 I forgot the last line there and destroy the work of your hands. 1356 01:18:33,120 --> 01:18:35,760 You know, as we said, destroying the work of your hands was 1357 01:18:36,120 --> 01:18:38,960 destroying the meets vote that the Jews were doing and possibly 1358 01:18:38,960 --> 01:18:42,000 just destroying the children. So again, this I think makes 1359 01:18:42,000 --> 01:18:45,880 clear again, you know, just in a more tabular form that your Sami 1360 01:18:45,880 --> 01:18:47,960 is really interpreting the Tosefta. 1361 01:18:47,960 --> 01:18:50,680 Along different lines. And doesn't really have 1362 01:18:50,680 --> 01:18:53,560 independent traditions about what Alicia did. 1363 01:18:55,560 --> 01:18:57,560 Fantastic. Yeah, so you could you could 1364 01:18:57,560 --> 01:19:00,120 splice that in and edit it or I guess you could leave it at the 1365 01:19:00,120 --> 01:19:02,360 end or you could just submit it if you don't think it's helpful 1366 01:19:02,360 --> 01:19:03,480 at all, it's. Definitely helpful. 1367 01:19:03,480 --> 01:19:05,880 I don't think we need. AI don't think it needs to be 1368 01:19:05,880 --> 01:19:06,960 edited. I think we could just leave it 1369 01:19:06,960 --> 01:19:09,200 as is because it's part of the anyway. 1370 01:19:09,840 --> 01:19:11,400 All right. So, so you can see, you know, 1371 01:19:11,400 --> 01:19:13,680 but really both like you said, both stories go in different 1372 01:19:13,680 --> 01:19:16,640 ways but they both really go back to the SEPTA and then what 1373 01:19:16,640 --> 01:19:20,800 we'll what we'll do and subsequent subsequent podcasts, 1374 01:19:20,800 --> 01:19:25,040 subsequent you know recordings is in one we'll have to do the 1375 01:19:25,040 --> 01:19:27,280 Ursami because it's a very long story you know. 1376 01:19:27,280 --> 01:19:29,920 It'll take a while. And then in a separate 1, the 1377 01:19:29,920 --> 01:19:31,720 Bavli. And then, you know, we could 1378 01:19:31,720 --> 01:19:33,800 even think about a third one about other traditions. 1379 01:19:34,160 --> 01:19:37,920 But you know, much of it goes back to the Tosefta and the 1380 01:19:37,920 --> 01:19:41,720 verse that gets spun out. You know, medrashically almost 1381 01:19:41,720 --> 01:19:45,320 in different ways to generate these different pseudo 1382 01:19:45,520 --> 01:19:48,480 biographical traditions about what Alicia did. 1383 01:19:48,920 --> 01:19:53,600 And we're going to get into the motivations behind the way the 1384 01:19:53,600 --> 01:19:57,600 Bavli and the Ushami characterized Ahir, right? 1385 01:19:57,600 --> 01:20:00,440 That's going to be part of it. Yeah, we'll get into what the 1386 01:20:00,440 --> 01:20:03,920 Bavli and Ushami want to want to explore, want to teach through 1387 01:20:03,920 --> 01:20:06,680 the figure of of Usher. I think of Ahir. 1388 01:20:06,680 --> 01:20:08,840 I think they. You know, they go in different 1389 01:20:08,840 --> 01:20:11,680 directions, but they use it for their own purposes because, you 1390 01:20:11,680 --> 01:20:13,360 know, like you said, they weren't so interested in this 1391 01:20:13,360 --> 01:20:16,800 mystical speculation anymore. Or if they were, they weren't, 1392 01:20:17,560 --> 01:20:19,920 You know, they weren't generating traditions for the 1393 01:20:19,920 --> 01:20:23,720 Talmuds that really went into that in detail. 1394 01:20:23,720 --> 01:20:25,200 They thought that should be esoteric. 1395 01:20:25,200 --> 01:20:26,800 They thought that should be secret. 1396 01:20:27,440 --> 01:20:31,760 And therefore when they had these sources in so SEPTA which 1397 01:20:31,760 --> 01:20:33,840 they had interpreted initially in those. 1398 01:20:34,160 --> 01:20:38,080 Ways that we saw today. They then took it to work out 1399 01:20:38,080 --> 01:20:40,480 different things that they were interested in, and they thought 1400 01:20:40,480 --> 01:20:43,960 that their audience of rabbis and students would be interested 1401 01:20:43,960 --> 01:20:45,400 in. And I'm that's what we're going 1402 01:20:45,440 --> 01:20:47,040 to get into eventually. Yeah. 1403 01:20:47,560 --> 01:20:51,840 I'm I'm very interested in the student aspect which is Robby 1404 01:20:51,840 --> 01:20:56,640 Mayer who you know he stays loyal to his teacher even after 1405 01:20:56,640 --> 01:20:59,840 his apostasy and he kind of never gives up on him and he 1406 01:20:59,840 --> 01:21:04,360 still learns from him and he and and then like offers just of 1407 01:21:04,440 --> 01:21:06,320 trying to push him away. He doesn't want him. 1408 01:21:06,320 --> 01:21:09,840 So I find that to be interesting because cutting off the shoots 1409 01:21:09,840 --> 01:21:12,280 doesn't really apply to every mayor. 1410 01:21:12,760 --> 01:21:14,960 So I find it very fascinating. Right. 1411 01:21:14,960 --> 01:21:19,920 Well, again, yeah, that's true. That's true in the Bobly. 1412 01:21:19,920 --> 01:21:25,120 Remember, it didn't take cut the shoots in terms of killing 1413 01:21:25,120 --> 01:21:26,880 students or cutting them off from Torah. 1414 01:21:26,880 --> 01:21:29,200 Yep, as you ever had the mayor in the Bobly. 1415 01:21:29,240 --> 01:21:30,760 But you're right. And they were finally it did 1416 01:21:30,760 --> 01:21:33,080 take it that way. And you do have traditions of 1417 01:21:33,080 --> 01:21:34,800 him and Rebbehr and they were Shami too. 1418 01:21:35,160 --> 01:21:36,920 So it didn't didn't take it that far. 1419 01:21:36,920 --> 01:21:39,680 Yes, that's true. So we're really looking forward 1420 01:21:39,680 --> 01:21:43,320 to it for all of our listeners. You know, this is a a lot to 1421 01:21:43,320 --> 01:21:45,840 cover. It's a subject that requires 1422 01:21:45,840 --> 01:21:48,960 hours and we can't just put it all on my podcast, but we're 1423 01:21:48,960 --> 01:21:51,520 looking forward to this series on Alicia Benablia. 1424 01:21:51,520 --> 01:21:54,840 It's such a fascinating topic and we want to thank you 1425 01:21:54,840 --> 01:21:57,880 Professor for coming on again. We really enjoyed talking to you 1426 01:21:57,880 --> 01:22:01,000 as usual and looking forward to the next podcast. 1427 01:22:01,360 --> 01:22:03,880 All right, great pleasure. We'll we'll do it when we can. 1428 01:22:04,640 --> 01:22:06,440 I feel like I just left the sheer right now. 1429 01:22:07,920 --> 01:22:09,640 Thank you so much. This is incredible. 1430 01:22:10,040 --> 01:22:11,160 Yeah, my pleasure. Bye. 1431 01:22:16,160 --> 01:22:18,400 Hey guys, thanks so much for tuning into the Judaism 1432 01:22:18,400 --> 01:22:21,440 Demystified podcast. 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So we are hoping to up our 1453 01:23:41,640 --> 01:23:46,960 quality and get better equipment and part of that process is 1454 01:23:46,960 --> 01:23:49,560 going to be due to you guys, the listeners and supporters. 1455 01:23:50,360 --> 01:23:55,920 If you go to our Patreon page, patreon.com/judaism, you will 1456 01:23:55,920 --> 01:23:58,200 see all the different tiers of ways you can help us out. 1457 01:23:58,200 --> 01:24:01,560 So first of all, we want to thank our super patron Jordan 1458 01:24:01,560 --> 01:24:06,160 Carmeli, our platinum patron, Craig Gordon, our gold patrons, 1459 01:24:06,720 --> 01:24:10,480 David Haye, Abram Khayev Laser Cohen, Travis Kruger, Vasily 1460 01:24:10,480 --> 01:24:16,760 Volkov, Silver patrons, Ellen Fleischer, Daniel Maximov, Rabbi 1461 01:24:16,760 --> 01:24:19,000 Penny Rosenthal and Jeffrey Wasserman. 1462 01:24:19,320 --> 01:24:23,520 Thank you all for supporting the show and we hope you guys enjoy.