Basic Concepts in Rabbinic Hermeneutics

Basic Concepts in Rabbinic Hermeneutics Basic Concepts in Rabbinic Hermeneutics Jose Faur Professor Faur teaches Talmud at Bar-Ban University. He is the author of Golden Doves with Silver Dots: Semiotics and Textuality in Rabbinic Tradition (1986) and In the Shadow ofHistory: Jews and Conversos at the Dawn ofModernity (1992). His latest book, Homo Mysticus: A Guide to Maimonides' Guide (Syracuse University Press), is due for publication this fall. 1. Writing and Interpretation In Western tradition "reading is the counterpart of the act ofwriting."l Its objective is to resolve the "distanciation" and "cultural estrangement" between the text and ourselves. Referring to Plato's theory of writing, Ricoeur explains: Writing and reading take place in this cultural struggle. Reading is the pharmakon, the "remedy," by which the meaning of the text is "rescued" from the estrangement of distanciation and put in a new proximity, a proximity which suppresses and preserves the cultural distance and includes the otherness within the on~ness.2 Ideally, the object ofreading is to penetrate the mind of the author, to become the author, and thus unveil the meaning of the text as intended by the author. Since this ideal is impossible-as Borges (1900-1986) showed in"Pierre Menard, Author ofthe Quixote"-every reading is necessarily a misreading. Hence the preeminence of oral communication over writing in Platonic and Greek philosophical tradition. For the Hebrews "writing" is not structurally connected to "reading." The term qara not only designates 'reading,' but also purely atextual oral activities, such as 'calling' and 'summoning.' Rather, as we hope to show below, "writing" is the counterpart of"interpretation": writing and interpretation are structurally connected to one another. Essential to Rabbinic Judaism is the beliefthat together with the Scripture or Written Law, God gave the Jews the Oral Law. The Ge'onim (heads ofthe Talmudic Ipaul RicoeuT, Interpretation Theory: Discourse and the Surplus ofMeaning (Fort Worth: The Texas Christian University Press, 1976), p. 71. 2Ricoeur, Interpretation Theory, p. 43 2 SHOFAR Fa111997 Vol. 16, No. I Academies in Babylonia) taught,3 and Maimonides (1135-1204) later on codified,4 that the Oral Law is the officialpirosh ('interpretation') of the Written Law.5 Accordingly, "interpretation" is intrinsic to the Hebrew concept of "Scripture" and writing. The relation "writing/interpretation" follows a principle of general linguistics, whereby writing-any kind of writing-necessarily involves a mental, unwritten context. "My work consists oftwo parts," wrote Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889-1951), "the one present here plus all that I have not written. And it is precisely this second part that is the important one.,,6 Accordingly, for every written text there must be an oral counterpart-a Tora shebe 'alpe. Unlike Derrida's theories, this idea implies that a written text presupposes a privileged interpretation. From the preceding it follows that "interpretation" is not the exclusive privilege of a divinely revealed text: derasha [plural: derashot] 'exegesis,' 'interpretation,' applies also to secular documents.7 More to the point, the sacred text may be the object of human interpretation. The Rabbis taught that the Tora itself has granted this right, mikan shenatna tora reshut li-drosh ('we [learn] from here that the Tora has granted the authority to expound').8 Indeed, Maimonides regarded the right to interpret (lidrosh) Scripture as one of the three basic Rabbinic institutions.9 Some contemporary scholars question the traditional distinction between derash and peshat (usually translated as 'plain sense')10 in Rabbinic literature. It has been noted that interpretations presented by the Rabbis as peshat are in fact homilies, basically not different from derash. 11 Conversely, many Rabbinic derashot do in fact convey the 3Nissim Ga'on, Sefer ha-MafteafJ, ed. J. Goldenthal (Vienna, 1847), 2b. 4Mishne Tora, eds. Katzenelenbogen and Liebennan (Jerusalem: Mossad Harav Kook, 1964), Introduction, 1.3; Pirush ha-Mishnayot, ed. and trans. R. Joseph Qafil,1 (Jerusalem: Mossad Harav Kook, 1967), 7 vols., vol. I, pp. 1-2, 16. See Joseph Nai,lmias, Pirush Pirqe Abot, ed. L. M. Bamberger (Faks, 5667/1907), I, I, fol. la. 5See my Golden Doves with Silver Dots: Semiotics and Textuality in Rabbinic Tradition (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1986), pp. II I-I 12. 6Ludwig Wittgenstein, Worterbuchfiir Volksschulen (Vienna: Holden-Picher-Tempsky, 1977...