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C h a p t e r 5 Refuting the Yetzer: The Limits of Rabbinic Discursive Worlds Being fully internalized, the evil yetzer cannot use direct coercion, as other demons do. It is restricted to inner, dialogical means in its attempts to achieve the sinister goal of leading its host astray. Various arguments are thus cited in the name of the yetzer in rabbinic literature, and these are the focus of this chapter. Ascribing an argument to the yetzer has an immediate discursive effect. Even an allegedly local, harmless controversy becomes acute, and dangerous, when identified with the yetzer. My basic argument in this chapter is that the rabbis use the yetzer exactly for this purpose: to mark potentially risky areas. Identifying a question or refutation as belonging to the yetzer automatically disqualifies it and thus serves as a hazard sign, warning the audience to keep away from ideologically dangerous zones. By ascribing arguments to the yetzer, the homilists prevent their audience from actually engaging them. Know Your Enemy: The Yetzer’s “Pretexts of Permissions” We have already seen Boaz’s dramatic encounter with his yetzer on the threshing floor (Sifre Numbers 88) and analyzed the characteristics of the yetzer and its arguments in this classic R. Ishmaelian homily in detail. One question, however, remained unanswered: why does Boaz keep so quiet? Why does he not even try to refute his yetzer’s argument? Or, if the yetzer’s claim is indeed irrefutable, why doesn’t Boaz listen to it? What is wrong with accepting the yetzer’s advice (in accordance with an explicit mishna), and why doesn’t the homilist explain this outright? A similar phenomenon was revealed in Sifre Deuteronomy 33, citing the struggle between Boaz and his evil yetzer as part of an “index” of negative 88 Chapter 5 acts, from which biblical heroes refrain by taking an oath: Abraham’s taking of booty following the war of the four kings against the five in Genesis; David ’s opportunity to kill his pursuer, Saul, in Samuel; and, finally, Elisha’s taking of wages for healing Naaman in Second Kings. Although each of these acts could be easily justified (which other exegeses do),1 the biblical heroes , as this exposition has it, refrain from doing so by taking an oath. They tether themselves in order to fight the yetzer’s temptations. By identifying them with the yetzer, the homily transforms these apparently borderline activities into prohibitions. According to the midrashic exegeses , the halakhic arguments that would seem to permit Boaz to sleep with Ruth, as well as the other permissive rulings, are themselves the counsel of the evil yetzer. The yetzer is thus used by the exegete as a code name for the resolving of halakhic doubts: what appears doubtful looks that way only because of the advice of one’s yetzer, while in actuality it is illegitimate. This is made clear by the ending of the homily: “And just as the righteous adjure their yetzer not to do [these things listed above] so too the evildoers adjure their yetzer to do [them; ‫לעשות‬ ‫יצרן‬ ‫את‬ ‫משביעין‬ ‫רשעים‬ ‫]כך‬.” The choice is binary : either you struggle against the yetzer or you are in league with it; there is no middle way. A similar doctrine appears in two other homilies from the school of R. Ishmael discussed above: Mekhilta of Rabbi Ishmael, Bahodesh 6 (ed. HorowitzRabin , 243; “Scripture went to such lengths in pursuit of the evil yetzer in order not to leave room for any pretext of permitting [‫התר‬ ‫]אמתלת‬ [idolatry])” and the Mekhilta Dearayot in Sifra Aharei Mot 13 (ed. Weiss, 86a; “Still, the evil yetzer can think to say, their [laws] are better than ours. Scripture therefore teaches: observe them faithfully, for that will be proof of your wisdom and discernment [Deut 4:6]”). In the Mekhilta on Exodus, the yetzer’s deduction, which Scripture foresees and preempts, was a specific legal loophole, while in Sifra it is a meta-legal conclusion regarding the value of “our” laws in comparison to “theirs.” In both cases Scripture’s instructions must be specific enough in order to block the yetzer from using vague statements to argue against the laws. Though the yetzer does not struggle against the precepts of the Torah directly but only through “pretexts of permission,” its goal is still destructive. Its claims are to be rejected not on the basis of their content, which might appear legitimate , but on the basis of its hidden agenda. The alleged permission is only a vehicle to...

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