Pirkei Avot Chapter 3: Mishna 10 - Rabbi Meir on Forgetting Torah
Pirkei Avot - The Wisdom of the Fathers
Shiur #21:
Forgetting Torah
By Rav Moshe
Taragin
The tenth Mishna of the
third perek lodges an astounding
claim in the name of Rabbi Meir: whoever forgets any Torah he has learned
deserves death. Rabbi Meir cites a
pasuk in Vaetchanan which sternly warns against
forgetting the 'items' which your eyes beheld at Har Sinai. Since the warning is prefaced by the
term "shemor nafshekha me'od"
(you should carefully guard your soul), Rabbi Meir infers that the penalty of
death applies. Though the Mishna
ultimately qualifies this 'harsh' statement, it is still an astonishing and even
shocking, assertion.
Several parallel
Gemarot echo the warning of this
Mishna- albeit with more moderate terminology.
For example, the Gemara
in Menachot (99b) in a more
moderate tone mentions that forgetting Torah is in violation of a prohibition -
based upon the very same pasuk
cited by Rabbi Meir in Avot. However, even that Gemara in Menachot sounds a warning with equal
severity to the caution of Avot. It cites Rabbi Yochanan and Rabbi
Eliezer who equate the 40 days of the delivery of Torah to the 40 days of the
early development of a fetus.
Though this parallel may highlight a GENERAL analogy between Torah and
nature, the continuation of the Gemara cites a more normative message. If someone preserves their Torah
knowledge, their soul is conserved; by contrast if the Torah is not retained,
the soul is not protected. This
assertion is slightly different from Rabbi Meir's warning in two manners. Firstly, it does not directly speak of
death, rather of a soul being watched or protected (nishmeret in Hebrew). Conceivably, the Gemara could be
interpreted as referring to general detrimental consequences of forgetting Torah
- but not necessarily death. In
addition the Gemara in Menachot
does not articulate death in a legal sense as the Mishna in Avot implies when it announces that this
person is "mitchayev be-nafsho" -
deserving of death. Instead, the
Gemara in Menachot, in striking a
parallel between human life and Torah, extends this parallel to indicate that
squandering Torah knowledge poses dire natural consequences for human life. In a similar vein, the Gemara in
Sanhedrin (99a) cites Rabbi Yehoshua who compares forgetting of Torah to the
burying of children and also mentions Rabbi Yehoshua ben Karcha who likens his
experience to planting but not harvesting.
In each instance, to highlight the perversion or natural distortion of
non-Torah retention, the gemara
cites natural cases of unfulfilled potential. It does not assign death as the penalty
for forgetting, but merely laments the tragedy by invoking death as an
analogy.
This statement of Rabbi
Meir served as the source for an interesting doctrine and a related
curriculum. In his treatise upon
Talmud Torah, Rabbi Shneur Zalman
Mi-Ladi the original Lubavitcher Rabbi, claims that Torah study contains two
very different mitzvot. The more popular mitzva demands Torah
study regardless of the manner in which it is studied or the volume of Torah
retained. Presumably, a person
could study the very same Torah issue for his entire life and fulfill his base
commitment. However, based upon
this pasuk in Vaetchanan and the editorial of Rabbi
Meir, the Lubavitcher Rabbi develops a second component to the mitzva not
merely to study Torah but to KNOW it.
One who studies and forgets does not diminish the fulfillment of the
first mitzva but compromises the achievement of the second. Based upon this theory, Rabbi Shneur
Zalman proposed a bold new curriculum for Torah study. Each day a person should first review
all the Torah he has studied until that point, and only after reinforcing his
retention of old knowledge may he advance to uncharted Torah study. Advancing to new Torah study without
fully consolidating acquired knowledge would neglect the mitzva of Torah
knowledge. By and large, this
educational model has not been adopted- neither at a personal level or a
communal one. No yeshiva in the
world adheres to this model, though each in varying degrees dedicates periods of
the day, and by extension parts of the year, to chazara - review of Torah knowledge. In a famous retort, Rav Chayim Volozin
quoted in the sefer known as
ma'aseh Rav (siman 53) - claims
that the prohibition of forgetting Torah only applied to those who once studied
Torah by heart before the oral tradition was canonized. In this historical context, forgetting
Torah knowledge is criminal since it threatens the integrity of the Masora. However, in our modern context, in which
all of our Torah has been committed to writing, the prohibition no longer
persists.
Even if we reject the
claim of Rav Chayim Volozin and maintain the relevance of this prohibition
within the modern context, we may still dispute the manner in which the
Lubavitcher Rabbi applied the prohibition.
After all, the conclusion of the Mishna appears to significantly qualify
the harsh beginning.
Quoting the end of the
verse in Vaetchanan which warns
against "removing Torah from your heart" (u-phen yasuru milvavkha) the Mishna
indicts those who actively delete their Torah knowledge but seems to excuse
those whose learning 'overwhelms' them.
Though the Mishna severely qualifies the instance of death penalty, its
actual categories are not that clear.
What type of behavior qualifies as 'active deletion' and which attitude
reflects "being overwhelmed by his study."
To further complicate matters, the parallel Gemara in Menachot excuses someone who is an
ones, instead of excusing someone
whose learning overwhelmed his memory.
In some ways, the syntax of Avot seems superior to formulation of
Menachot. In Avot one who naturally looses knowledge
because he is overwhelmed (cannot naturally retain all his knowledge) is excused
and only one who actively deletes is indicted. This system seems symmetrical of
course without fully explaining how a person can 'actively' delete his Torah
knowledge. By contrast, the Gemara
in Menachot exempts an ones presumably one who is ill or old
and indicts one who actively deletes.
In fact, based upon the Gemara's terminology the Rabbeinu Yonah, in his
commentary to Avot, inserts this
definition into the Mishna in Avot: only an ones who is ill or otherwise compromised
is excused from guilt. However, the
Gemara leaves a gap by not addressing someone who is not afflicted but does not
actively delete Torah knowledge.
Ultimately, the Mishna in
Avot proposes a tighter system.
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