The Secret Diary of Ben Zoma: Hearsay Heresy/And the Empty Space/Of an Earthenware Vessel

By John W. McGinley

So. Think about this. Once this foreigner is brought into the House of Israel ((albeit a foreigner who emerged from the House of Israel)) and then comes to rule it, the House of Israel itself ended up becoming, in fact, a collective apostate alienated from its burning living center. In the following I acknowledge the paradox involved in what I am saying given what is said in the Gemaric commentaries about Akher. But again, think it through. What would it mean to be an apostate from an institution which itself has apostatized? In this sense Elisha ben Abbuyah becomes the model for a grand teshuvah whose contours, as we shall see, are radically paradoxical:

RETURN! O BACKSLIDING CHILDREN

Today -- to pick up one of those figures used in Hagigahs attempt to give cautious approval of such rehabilitation for Elisha ben Abbuyah -- Judaism is a shell whose kernel has virtually disappeared. If nothing changes nothing changes. Judaism will implode in upon itself and disappear. If you are able to see the mortal danger into which Judaism has strayed you will be able to garner the imagination to read -- as though for the very first time -- the forthcoming thrice-articulated verse-and-commentary. It was first stated by Hashem to Akher. It was then twice repeated by Akher to Meir. You need to turn the telescope around to understand its true import. Think again of the logic entailed by the apostate who apostatizes from an apostatizing Institution. Just how long will it take for you to get it? Till its too late?

RETURN! O BACKSLIDING CHILDREN!
[whispering for proper effect]:

except for Akher

It is not Akher who needs to return.

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Oct 30, 2008
• ISBN: 9781440101052

John W. McGinley

John W. McGinley holds a PhD in Philosophy from Boston College and an MA in Jewish Studies from Gratz College; he resides in Farmingdale, NJ.

Book preview

Copyright © 2008 by John W. McGinley

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ISBN: 978-1-4401-0103-8 (pbk)

ISBN: 978-1-4401-0105-2 (ebk)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2008939021

Contents

Dedicatory Reflections

I.

A Postscript necessarily functioning as Prefatory Remarks

II

Introuduction

III

Hovering in the Air? Mountains Hanging from a Hair?

IV.

Jewish Esoterica

V.

Supplement.

Outline by Way of Division and Section Headings

Acknowledgements.

Dedicatory Reflections 

when we learn to love hell

we will be in heaven

Thaddeus Golas

by way of Philip Toy

Cloud Cottage

Black Mountain, NC

* * * * *

Our Master said: Everybody says that there is this world [i.e., the world of earthly pleasures ] and there is also the world to come. Now with regard to the world to come –— we believe in its existence. Perhaps this world also exists somewhere. But [this place] where we are now appears to be hell, since everyone is so constantly filled with sorrows. And he said: ‘This world’ does not exist at all.

[Rabbi Nachman of Uman as reported by Rabbi Nathan of Nemirov. Arthur Green’s translation contained in The Tormented Master, page 164.]

* * * * *

the trouble with evil is that

it seduces us into eliminating it

Thaddeus Golas

by way of the Wikipedia

article on Thaddeus Golas

* * * * *

I would have said: it seduces us into trying to eliminate it.

I learned of Thaddeus Golas and his book only this morning, April 19th, 2008. I have not read his book nor do I intend to. April 19th, happens to be the anniversary of my sister’s birthday who died in 1996. Her name by birth was Mary Loretta McGinley. Her name by marriage was Mary Carr. As a child and for some of my adulthood I knew her as and referred to her as Tootsie. My parents, Jack and Loretta (Brown) McGinley, used to tell me that Tootsie evolved as my mangled attempt to say (baby) titter [sister] when referring to this sibling who was but eleven months younger than I. Perhaps they too had a role in this transformative elision. I dedicate this book to all the members of my family of origin with love and gratitude. Only my younger brother Jim and myself still survive.

John Vincent McGinley

Loretta (Brown) McGinley

Mary Loretta McGinley (aka Mary Carr)

James Brown McGinley

[and also, the one for whom 4-19-08 will have been a turning point]

* * * * *

The idea of a place where there is no suffering

is an illusion

Thich Nhat Hanh

by way of

Philip Toy

* * * * *

John Willard McGinley

April 19, 2008 (the day I started writing this book)

* * * * *

I. 

A Postscript necessarily functioning as Prefatory Remarks 

My audience does not yet exist.

The Written instantiates the future pluperfect. The Written is the memorialization of the future. There is [es gibt] a future at all only by virtue of its prior memorialization. The Written is the feature by which there is [es gibt] human history at all. As such The Written (— eternally long before it comes into being in the sense of the sequential ‘before and after’ which is the ordinary <and unavoidable> human experience of time —) elicits cosmological, biological, and psycho-social evolution for the purpose that there be a memorialization of the future which allows for and makes possible that there be a future at all. [[Indeed, The Written (— in its decisive, unique, and all-encompassing instantiation as Torah —) even elicits the event of tsimtsum itself. For the meaning of tsimtsum in this book you must refer to the section entitled Disquisition on ‘Outside Learning.’]] Such is the truth of the Messianic hope: that there be a future at all.

* * * * *

(((it started when I was almost finished with the first draft of this book I tried to shut down my lap top but it would not turn off while I was re-trying to turn the lap top off writing started of itself to materialize on the monitor it started off very hazily but slowly it achieved clarity it was in a longhand script reminiscent of the script of the Palmer method by which children used to learn longhand script in parochial schools there was appropriate spacing between words but nothing else no capitalization no punctuation or indentation it was written in a kind of British vernacular that one might come across if reading a novel or something generated in England say in the first decade of the twentieth century each time a transmission would occur it was signed son of ben-Zoma I found that it was impossible for me to save any of these transmissions even though I would frantically try to do so several times I found out that each transmission would remain screened (but never savable) <> for a generous amount of time then it would slowly fade from the screen and the lap top would then shut down in accord with what I had tried to do before this or that transmission occurred I learned to take notes and or read each transmission several times most of each transmission was just stated but not stated as though addressed to me or anyone else on the other hand sometimes with about a three line space between the non-addressed portion and the more-or-less addressed portion (which usually was shorter) this son of ben-Zoma seemed to be talking directly to the recipient although the recipient was not named on the other hand again there were some circumstantial references in these direct communications which indicated that they were indeed directly intended for me but he did not call me by name there were as I recall thirty-seven of these transmissions and thirteen of them included these addenda having the sense of a direct communication

he told me that these transmissions came from the neshamah ensconced without rest but nevertheless happy in the heavenly academy of ben Zoma himself ben Zoma as with every other human being who has ever lived and died had died with finality but some of the surviving neshamot produced by worthy individuals found themselves in olam ha ba* and some of those were lucky enough to be accepted up here his phrasing into the Heavenly Academy

*. [The reader is referred to pages 105-107 of The God with Moral Fault for the meaning of produced in this context.]

this son of ben-Zoma admitted that ben Zoma himself had been on the flakey side that is why he was so vulnerable to the machinations of Joshua and Aqiba as they were trying to line up their allies and eliminate and/or severely discredit their opponents as that decisive day approached the transmitter also informed me (but not called by name) that these transmissions were able to be received only by someone whose complex and erratic neurophysiology imprinted into the hard-drive of my lap top over many years of typing was symbiotically receptive to that complex and erratic neurophysiology characteristic of ben-Zoma himself while the neshamah produced by ben Zoma i.e., son of ben-Zoma was not ben Zoma the imprint of the neurophysiology of ben Zoma was nevertheless-and-sotospeaksotospeaksotospeak imprinted on and into the son of ben Zoma not unlike sostospeaksotospeaksotospeak how the imprint of the recipient’s (e.g., presumably mine) neurophysiology somehow was transmitted into the hard-drive of an often used computer through years of typing it was only in the last five or six years that such transmissions were even possible at all a possibility which emerged as a function of the revolutions in wireless technology but time is not a big factor in Heaven its inhabitants are not impatient time takes time this I must earn

he did however make it clear that it was not until I had been producing what I had to say in my writings including especially this one combined with my various portrayals in my previous books of certain key presentations in classical Rabbinic literature dealing with the encounter between Joshua and ben Zoma and as well combined with what I had produced about Joshua’s late in life remorse and his Joshua’s correlative inauguration of the snail-paced process by which Akher came to be rehabilitated [I am almost certain that the son of Ben Zoma is here referring to my account of Joshua on pages four, five, six, seven, and eight of The Early Tannaim and the Forbidden Relations.] in other words all three written conditions had to have been met that the Heavenly Academy voted to when the time would be right to initiate these transmissions there was a clear but not overwhelming majority by the members of the academy to send these transmissions interestingly enough Hashem abstained from the vote raising sotospeaksotospeaksotospeak some eyebrows in any case the time became right as the neuronic activity of the recipient which would not even permit the recipient to sleep at night since the steady maintenance of such a level of neuronic activity severely aggravated the recipient’s tinnitus reached the required threshold for such transmission all of this started occurring as I and I am presuming I was the intended recipient and that this was not just all a big mistake was finishing the first draft of the book dear cherished reader which you are reading that is to say if I don’t stroke out from all of this ceaseless neuronic activity

of the three extant rabbinic only classical Rabbinism counts accounts of this encounter between Joshua and ben Zoma the one in the Bavli the one in the Palestinian Talmud and the one in Genesis Rabbah of those three accountings this son of ben-Zoma wanted me to concentrate on the Bavli account yes yes yes the other two accounts especially the account in Genesis Rabbah did and quite accurately catch the demeaning and public shaming which Joshua perpetrated on the vulnerable ben Zoma which was all part of the fairly vicious mission that the Joshua/Aqiba faction was undertaking this son of ben-Zoma let me know that the Bavli account does not emphasize at least not as much this dimension of Joshua’s action because the Bavli account was sensitive to the importance for the Rabbinic Movement as a whole which Joshua’s remorse (and actions) had shortly before Joshua himself died before the onset of the Bar Kochba Rebellion but more significantly a close reading of the Bavli accounting shows ever so indirectly as was necessary for those final anonymous editors (some of whom are also in the Heavenly Academy he informs me) that essentially ben Zoma was the one with insight on this matter of the distance between the upper and lower waters ben Zoma when he was in these semi-trance-like states let things flow from his mouth without so to speak lining up all his ducks before expounding this son of ben Zoma expressed his hope and confidence that I would explain some of these things in some addendum to this prefatory remarks section and that indeed was my intention

but HEENEI!!! the very next transmission without any referring back to the previous transmission was coaxing me to telescope together the Bavli accounting and the accounting from Genesis Rabbah what was going on? the rest of the transmission went on to other matters and did not refer back to this nor did the son of ben Zoma ever again refer to this change of tactic in any of the other transmissions which made it to my screen but then I remembered the son of ben Zoma although he was not ben Zoma himself even in olam ha ba was imprinted with the same complex and erratic neurophysiology with which I was endowed could it be? was I receiving an instruction? in this case relative to conflicting accounts of the encounter between Joshua and ben Zoma to engage in the neither-nor-and-both-at-once logic which although I first imbued it from sitting at the feet of Aristocles I intuitively understood to be the living logic of Scripture Itself and all classical writing which was attuned to the inner logic of Scripture which is at the same time the inner logic of God’s Self Revelation of God through by and AS Scripture if so and it and seemed so we would be working with a whole composed of two specified-and-negated parts which could obtain only as the whole OF — both senses of the genitive — two-specified-and-negated parts the whole then negating each part even as said whole could not obtain without each specified-but-negated part I now understood that my accounting of the Joshua/ben-Zoma accounting would be have to be more complex I can only attempt to do my best

this son of ben-Zoma did explain that ben-Zoma did have some significant character defects he was voracious in his appetite for learning but so to speak overly voracious and without measure he made himself vulnerable to the attacks visited upon him by Joshua partly by virtue of this untamed voraciousness the Bavli comment herewith was in fact accurate when it applied these words from Proverbs 25:18 to ben Zoma:

when you find honey, eat what is sufficient for you, lest you be [over]satiated and vomit it up

[Art Scroll 14b-iii]

on the other hand the son of ben-Zoma maintained that ben-Zoma was one of the leading lights in that first quarter of a century after the destruction of the Temple he was along with Rabbi Meir one of the favorites of Rabbi Ishmael he certainly was brighter than Rabbi Aqiba and orders and orders of magnitude brighter than Rabbi Joshua but his social skills were atrocious his habits idiosyncratic and sometimes unnerving voracious to a fault and when he was in one of those semi-trance-like states (he often was even when expounding publicly) things came out of his mouth which in fact were pearls of wisdom but they flowed out carelessly without measure and as noted he was on the flakey side even when not in those semi-trance-like states thus vulnerable always to attack and his disposition was not to counter attack but in so doing i.e., not counter attack he paid a terrible price in his own self-esteem

ben Zoma it turns out was quite jealous of Rabbi Meir he understood that Rabbi Meir like himself was a Torah Scholar of genius proportions but Rabbi Meir was measured in his demeanor and his comportment he gained the respect of all even those who were on opposites sides in the ever-growing factional dispute of those days ben Zoma resented the fact that Rabbi Meir was able to be on good terms with both Rabbi Ishmael and Rabbi Aqiba ben Zoma could see what was coming but too vulnerable to prevent it and thought it was shallow of Meir to be trying to please both factions although ben Zoma would be long dead — first having been drummed out of the Movement by the machinations of Joshua and Aqiba something which literally broke his heart — when Meir finally came around ((the straw which broke so to speak the camel’s back was Aqiba’s romanticizing of the robber baron and Aqiba acted only after the demise of Joshua who would never have allowed such by ratcheting up the Liar into a messianic figure and correlatively putting the significant prestige power and immense influence of the Rabbinic Movement in the service of the Liar thus perpetrating the rivers of blood which were SO obscenely UN-NECESSARY Meir never spoke to him again <the son of ben Zoma and of course there was never any doubt on this Rabbi Meir as the son of R. Nehemyah made it into the Heavenly Academy as did of course Rabbi Ishmael Rabbi Aqiba did not>>))

the son of ben Zoma informed the recipient whom I believe to be me although I was not called by name that sometimes I was nothing more than an amanuensis for the neurophysiological transmissions being typed by me other times I was only speaking for myself they generally liked what I had to say and decided that I should even now more or less keep the production in the form in which I wrote it and without notations concerning what was by me and what was by me qua amanuensis and indeed I myself would not be able to make the distinction between my being but an amanuensis here so to speak and a writer there so to speak nor did the son of ben-Zoma give me any insight on this the direction given was to retain the book the way I had been writing it as I started to say without any notations as to when and where I was just amanuensis and where and when I was writing as me predictably he picked up somehow on my tentative decision to change the subtitle of the book to The Secret Diary of ben Zoma transmitted from the Heavenly Academy after all each transmission started with the following phrase scripted in boldface: the secret diary of ben Zoma even so the son of ben Zoma preferred to keep the original subtitle:

Meditations on the Oral Torah and Jewish Esoterica

[Dear cherished reader. The original title was to have been:

Akherian Vision

Ishmaelic Listening

By now, I’m sure, you have put two and two and two together.]

I appealed the decision or was it just a suggestion? but who in his right mind would change a decision which had the approval of the Heavenly Academy? I have yet to receive a response does silence imply consent in such a situation?)))

* * * * *

{{{{{Note.

My Dear Cherished Reader:

Writing sometimes pretends that it is, in effect, a holiday from life. But of course it is not. The relative merits and advantages of maintaining or not maintaining such a pretense can be debated by people of good will. But the inescapable fact is that I am not able to maintain such a pretense. The disruptive in life comes knocking at our door uninvited. So too in writing. This is my way of handling it.

By rights you should now be going to the accountings, just below, of the two scenes between Rabbi Joshua and Ben Zoma alluded in the transmissions, just above. I am not an especially organized and orderly writer to begin with. But the sudden intrusion of those transmissions, coming as they did after the first draft of the book was finished, makes it virtually impossible to not disrupt your reading at this juncture.

The transmissions, for better or for worse, speak for themselves. Those transmissions, by rights, should glide immediately into the accountings of those two scenes. But the accounting of those two scenes is based on a conceptual orientation discussed in that first draft in what is now the Third Chapter Heading. That discussion belongs there and it belongs here as well. But it belongs there more than it belongs here. So here is a solution.

Go right now to Division "B" of that Third Chapter Heading. You will see immediately a heading called The Yadin Factor. It’s about a page and a half long. Read it now. Stop when you get to "B-1" and return to the accountings of those two scenes.

If you exist at all, dear cherished reader, I thank-you for your patience. It is not easy reading a book written by me. I know. JWM}}}}}

A-1. The Bavli Accounting of the Encounter between ben Zoma and Joshua. [15a-i–15a-ii; Art Scroll]

a). The significance of the scene setting.

An incident occurred with R. Yehoshua ben Chananyah as he was standing upon a step on the Temple Mount. Now, ben Zoma saw him but did not stand up before him ((etc., etc.)).

Our final anonymous editors of the Bavli, here, take this scene out of actual time and space (as opposed to the conceivably real time and space of the accounting given in Genesis Rabbah <2-4> ) Certainly ben Zoma — we are in the Yabneh days after all — was not expounding to his students on the Temple Mount! Further, as explained above, our final editors have made a decision as well to minimize the factor of public humiliation visited upon ben Zoma by Joshua . But in addition, in so doing they add on to the accounting an implied validation of ben Zoma over Rabbi Joshua, as we shall see below. ((It is not without significance that this scene — the temple Mount — is, in context, the memory of a terrible tragedy.))

Yehoshua said to him: Whither and whence?, ben Zoma

He responded: I have been contemplating the space between the upper waters and the lower waters. And there is between them only the breadth of three fingers. As it says: "And the breath of God hovered over the face of the waters. [From Genesis 1:2, contained in what will be referred to as the first day.] – Like a dove that hovers over her nest but does not quite touch them."

Yehoshua told his [ben Zoma’s disciples] disciples: "Clearly, the man is still ‘out to lunch.’ For recall: When was it that [this verse cited by ben Zoma as support for his contention] the breath of God hovered over the face of the waters? This was on the first day! It was only on the second day that the division [between the upper and lower waters] took place, as it is written: And let it [raqeeya] separate water from water. [From Genesis 1:6 contained in what will be referred to as the second day. <raqeeya is translated as expanse in the JPS translation>]

[I have used Art Scroll 15a-i as a frame for the translation. But I have freely used my memory of the Soncino translation as well as features from the JPS way of translating Genesis 1:6-8.]

* * * * *

If it were a debate, Joshua wins hands down. And as far as public humiliation is concerned, it probably was very effective. Joshua had his agendum — discrediting the key members of the opposition before the planned showdown — and ben Zoma had his. Let us leave the tawdriness of Joshua’s action aside. As referred to above, Joshua was half-right anyway {{after all, the walls did not fall entirely to the ground out of respect to Rabbi Joshua; I have addressed this extensively in my other writings}}and, as referred to above, what was tawdry and even vicious about Joshua’s lead-up to the day of the coiled snake was partly redeemed by the initiatives he [Joshua] took before he died. Our concern here is with ben Zoma and the point being made by our final editors — indirection being of the essence for this subterfugic undertaking of theirs — of the Bavli.

Ben Zoma was immersed in and infused with the work of creation. His sloppiness as to detail is on display in this vignette. [[As we shall see below, in this particular case, it is not impossible that ben Zoma was using his famed sloppiness as to detail as a counter subterfugic ploy against Joshua in the service of supporting his own agendum.]] Several observations:

a). I do not insist on this first point. I have suggested in the main part of this book and in some of my other writings that the six days of creation (and correlative seventh day of rest) motif was a framing imposed, ex post facto, on the original narrative by a Priestly redaction. There is nothing terribly astounding about such a claim. For either the entire narrative under discussion was a Priestly document to begin with or it was an E document ex post facto doctored by a Priestly redactor. I myself believe that there was an E document ex post facto doctored by a Priestly redactor which became the first creation narrative in the final redaction. My more radical claim, however, is that those who were involved in the Work of Creation in that first twenty-five years of the Rabbinic Movement after the destruction of the Temple were themselves aware of this six/seven-day ex post facto framing.* If one reads verses two through eight without such framing one has a very different experience about these water scenes. But let that pass. Obviously the by-then-closed version of the canon had this framing and as I have already argued all throughout this book, such ex post facto framing is also part of God’s Revelation of God through, by, and AS Scripture. The implications — then as well as now — for a ha-katuv reader of Scripture on such matters have been explained all throughout this book especially and also in my previous writings.

*. [[The Rabbis were more aware of ex-post-facto changes in Scripture than we ordinarily imagine. The mandated character of translation of the Hebrew Scriptures into Greek which became the Septuagint already furnishes clear examples of this. Genesis Rabbah — and interestingly enough especially with regard to the early chapters of Genesis — contains examples wherein the commentary refers to changes which seem to have crept back into the Hebrew text as a result of what the Egyptian officials found to be objectionable in the Scriptural accounts. There is also, at Genesis Rabbah 9-5, testimony to what seems to have been a textual dispute about verse thirty one of Chapter One of Genesis.

Our present point under discussion does concern itself with reference to corruption somehow creeping back into Hebrew text by virtue of the mandated Septuagint translation. But these examples cited just above show that the Rabbis were attuned to questions of textual authority, textual change, and textual corruption. The examples seem also to imply that these questions constituted raw material for much contentious debate among the Rabbis as they worked to bring about closure to the Scriptural canon.

Most people maintain that the debates concerning the closing of the canon occurred as the first order of business ((after having devoted a number of years to the social affairs of the people after the tremendous upheaval brought about by the sacking of Jerusalem)) of the Rabbinic Movement after the destruction of the Temple. One would have to accuse these very early Tannaim of wearing blinders if one maintained that they never discussed questions concerning how the various versions of the received texts before them were to be evaluated and which of them was to be validated. This brings us to the orchestrated (by Joshua) exchange between Joshua and ben Zoma.

After ben Zoma refers to the dove hovering over the water by no more than three finger-breadths, the Art-Scroll offers this translation of Joshua’s response:

Ben Zoma is still on the outside

In fact this is a better translation than what I offered for this sentence above. I believe that Joshua’s response has nothing at all to do with the elaborate footnote (15a-i; #13) which refers to a rather contrived interpretation of this statement by Maimonides. But it is a better translation. Following the implied suggestion of the Soncino translators I had offered the still out to lunch translation which points to questions concerning the mental stability of ben Zoma by and through which Joshua was trying to impugn ben Zoma’s credibility. The fact of the matter is that Joshua’s response can be understood as a kind of double entendre which is attacking ben Zoma on two fronts at once. The one just mentioned and another one even more menacing to ben Zoma’s future standing in the Rabbinic Movement. Let us return to Joshua’s response. I offer this possibility:

Ben Zoma is STILL separated off

This would mean that, by Joshua’s accusation, ben Zoma was still — in his interpretation of the passage in question — resisting one of the settled issues concerning the text of Genesis One. It is not at all beyond reasonable possibility that, in those very early debates concerning the final status of the Biblical canon in the first decade after the destruction of the Temple, objections were made concerning the intrusive six-days/seventh-day framing by a Priestly redactor of what was the original narrative of Chapter One. This issue, obviously, was settled in favor of maintaining the alleged ex post facto framing or — and the effect would be the same — maintaining that the framing had always been part of the original document. The case, in any case, was closed by the time of this orchestrated (by Joshua) encounter between Joshua and ben Zoma. In effect, Joshua would be indicting ben Zoma for trying to subvert — however indirectly — the settled Rabbinic view.]]*

*. [[I believe that the case to the effect that there was an original E-document narrative which ex post facto was subjected to a Priestly redaction so as to frame the narrative in the six-days-of-work and a seventh-day-of-rest motif is a credible case. I suggest that the original narrative had a repetitive motif of its own which had nothing to do with evening, morning, and days at all.

Rather the original document breaks up the work of creation into seven strata having nothing to do with days. For the first six strata the refrain and God saw that such was good is used, setting a mood which will cast in sharp relief God’s comment after the seventh strata which concerns itself only with the creation of the human. For after the seventh stratra God is presented as breaking the mood by announcing: HEENEI!!!! even death was good. [[Genesis Rabbah 9-5; commented on at great length both in other parts of this book and in my previous books.]] This last comment was itself was an ex post facto redaction (prior to the Priestly day-framing redaction) made to function as a segue into the death oriented drama of Chapters Two and Three. It is not impossible that the original E-document prior to this segue redaction contained the very good of what would become the final version after a finalized review by the Rabbis.

The Priestly redactors could not — their goal, after all, being to load the creation narrative with Shabbat significance — make their seven-day framing isomorphic with the seven strata motif of the original narrative since that would make the seventh day a day of work. So the framing had to be manipulated in such a way that the creation of the human was on the sixth day. In the narrative which came into the hands of the Priestly redactors the final word was death which functioned as the end of the narrative and as the connecting link to the death-oriented narrative of Chapters Two and Three. By having to push back the seventh strata of the original into the sixth day of their modification, the Priesthood redaction renders the whole narrative very choppy since there is an asymmetrical refrain written six times (i.e., there was evening and there was morning, the ____ day) competing with the mood setting refrain of the original written six times (i.e., and God saw that such was good) as a lead in-to the special significance of the seventh strata.

As already noted, the death segue of the original narrative (which was, I believe, kept that way, by the Priestly redaction) was the end of the seventh strata. But it was the end only of the sixth-day framing envisioned by the Priestly redaction. Therefore, in the Priestly redaction it is followed by the Priestly refrain: and there was evening and there was morning, the sixth day. To complete seven-days framing the Priestly redaction added on what came to be ((— this, of course, having nothing to do with the formation of any version of the Scriptural text up until that point of the Priestly redactive additions —)) the first three and one-half verses of Chapter Two. The Priestly redaction takes us up TO, but does not include, the b-yom of verse four.

Please understand. This hypothesis about the first creation narrative as it is now finalized is not at all a suggestion to amend Scripture. The finalization of the canon is a fait accompli and must be respected. Further, all such things as I have just reviewed are — by the argumentation of this book and my previous books — themselves intrinsic to God’s Self-Revelation of God through, by, and AS Scripture. And that is just the point.

The more we can learn about the genesis and pedigree of how Scripture — in the sequential timing of time by which it was received as that intersects with that timeless timing of time by which it was given at Sinai — came into being the more we can learn about God’s Self-Revelation of God through, by, and AS Scripture. And, incidentally, this particular portion of Scripture — when subjected to such analysis — can (and does, I suggest) throw light on that critical quarter of a century which constituted for Rabbinic Judaism: the time period for the closure of the canon; the original orientation of the Rabbinic Movement in its infancy; and the traumatic upheaval which so radically changed the character and direction of the Rabbinic Movement. This last has everything to do with the story of ben Zoma.]]

* * * * *

[In all these matters to follow, let us keep the following in mind. It is virtually certain that the magister ludi, so to speak, of the primary group involved in esoteric matters in that first quarter of a century was Rabbi Ishmael ben Elisha Akher.>. His main and most honored student in the portion of these matters referred to as the work of creation was ben Zoma.]

* * * * *

Continuing on.

b). A bit flakey. Speaking sometimes before he had coherently gathered the clarifying details of all of his thought. But, despite himself, a genius in these matters. His loss to the Rabbinic community was a tragedy.

c). Let it be noted that this expanse being talked about — but not quoted by Rabbi Joshua except by pronoun — will be called shamaiyim: Heaven, or, if it is important to you [the] Heavens; in contrast to Earth.

d). In verse two, God’s breath [or spirit; ruakh] is hovering over the face of the water. This is compared by and through the poetic mind of ben Zoma to a dove hovering over her young. After the vertical separation of water from water by way of the expanse this expanse is called Heaven where God dwells. So God, it would seem, dwells below the now upper waters and above the lower waters. God is between the two occupying, so to speak, the expanse/Heaven. The whole hovering motif — with its motherly dove-like function — governs ben Zoma’s interpretation irrespective of whether one is in the first day prior to the separation of the waters or in the second day after the separations of the waters. In other words — whether intentionally misconstrued by Joshua or through an orchestrated and planned misconstruing — Joshua’s gotcha! level response misses the true force of ben Zoma’s drashing.

e). And that’s the point. There is no great change concerning God and God’s motherly hovering over the water as we go from verse two to the separated version of God and the now-lower water in verses six and seven. If there is but three finger-breadths between the dove and the water in general, why should there be more than three finger-breadths between God and the now separated-and-now-lower water? In any case, there is, for ben Zoma, no substantial difference between the way God hovers over the water as it obtains during the first day and the now-lower water as it obtains during the second day. Ben Zoma did not articulate his position in the best manner framing contrary to the priorly settled Rabbinic decision>. Joshua had totally missed the point. And even if Joshua did in fact catch the multi-faceted subtlety of ben Zoma’s statement, he, Joshua, passed over it in favor of shaming ben Zoma in front of his disciples by making his debater-esque point <<confusion; and, b). tangentially, to draw attention to the fact that ben Zoma in his expounding was still finessing the contours of text of Scripture in a manner contrary to which the canon had been finalized>>>. >.

f). What ben Zoma comes to teach us is twofold. First, that God’s motherly presence remains a close and protecting motherly presence continuously, even as the conditions from the so-called first day become the conditions of the so-called second day. Secondly, ben Zoma keeps Heaven and Earth VERY close to each other, even after the separation of waters, by which separation, it should be noted, there is a Heaven at all.* Heaven is not so far away nor is Earth so far away from Heaven. Not at all! To be returned to below.

*. [Indeed, the whole business of naming the expanse Heaven after the separating of the waters helps us to understand what was really going on in and through the b-reishit bara Elohim [JPS has When God began to create] eit ha-shemaiyim v-eit ha-erets then continuing immediately with a description of the initial condition of ha-erets, all of this obtaining in verses one and two. The expanse, which in verse eight is called by God Heaven(s), is posterior to the condition of ha-erets when God began to create. This view — to the effect that ha-erets has some standing before Heaven(s) is compatible with some Rabbinic views which allow that, in some sense, earth preceded Heaven. A conceit in a similar vein is expressed in a baraita from the School of Ishmael at Hagigah 12b-i. [In any case and from every perspective — temporal, spatial, and with respect to honor — the closeness of Heaven(s) and Earth is affirmed.]

g). Doubtlessly the feminine image of God as a dove hovering over her children may have been objectionable to some portions of the early Rabbinic Movement. And it seems — assuming as I do that there is an incredibly close relationship between the endeavors of ben Zoma and the endeavors of Rabbi Ishmael ben Elisha (aka Akher) — that there is a connection between this motherly[i.e., feminine] accounting of God and the two powers/authorities in Heaven motif characteristic of at least one faction of those pursuing the work of the creation and the work of the chariot in that fateful first quarter of a century of the Rabbinic Movement after the destruction of the Temple.

h). What brought about the tipping point for Elisha ben Abbuyah which caused him to stand aside [apostasize]? To have one of his favorite, most talented (despite his thinking everything at once and thus appearing sloppy in his thinking), genius level mentees drummed out of the Movement (and perhaps out of his mind by virtue of that) by the likes of a Joshua who was not nearly so talented as ben Zoma and who was motivated by the power-play against the Aristocrats in which he, Joshua, was involved — such would have been a weighty factor in such a weighty decision for Elisha.

i). And how do our final editors help us to understand what’s really going on? Listen to the addendum to the vignette supplied by them. In effect, what they do very nicely makes the case that Heaven and Earth are indeed so intimately linked together that there is close to no difference between them at all! [[Food for thought, even — especially! — for today.]] Ben Zoma becomes more than validated through this mechanism by the anonymous final editors <>.

And how much [is the distance between the waters]?

Rav Akhar bar Yaakov says: a hairsbreadth. AND THE RABBIS SAY [the very seal of officialdom; our final editors are expropriating this code for their purposes; my emphasis, of course]: Like [the space between] one plank of a bridge [and the next one]. Mar Zutra, and some say, Rav Assi, says: Like two garments, one spread upon the other. And some say: Like two cups, one stuck inside the other.

[Art Scroll; pages 15a-i—15a-ii; translation very slightly amended.]

* * * * *

The vignette spoken of above is preceded by a review of two halakhic matters which were put before ben Zoma. Ben Zoma’s treatment ((in the second case, alleged treatment)) of these two matters — and each for a different reason — helps to explain why an aura of strangeness seemed to hang over ben Zoma even before the encounter between Joshua and ben Zoma (orchestrated by Joshua). Let us look at them separately.

a). Whether or not [from the context it becomes clear that the issue is with reference to Jews living in Israel] Jews may castrate their male dogs. Then as well as now the matter of unchecked proliferation of dogs — especially in the urban areas — led to the unsafe situation of stray dogs who were dangerous in their own right and who then added to the problem of unchecked proliferation. [[Obviously the neutering of female dogs was not then an issue.]] One can presume, therefore, that the practice of castrating male dogs was common and any halakhic ruling indicating otherwise would be very unpopular.

Ben Zoma was Rabbi Ishmael’s student in the work of the ha-katuv orientation in determining the full meaning and scope of Biblical mitsvot. Ben Zoma follows, in making the unpopular ruling that male dogs cannot be castrated in the Land of Israel, an interpretive middah generated by Ishmael himself for determining the halakhah. The principle is that when Scripture Itself speaks by using a superfluous phrasing in speaking of the application of a mitsvah <<<<please note: we are speaking of a whole phrase here; we are not speaking about spurious vavs or weighting an et with major halakhic significance all of which was Aqiba’s manner of twisting the ha-katuv orientation to support rulings and interpretations which — absent such manipulative devices — would not have Biblical support>>>> the superfluous phrasing points to a dimension of the Biblical mitsvah which the ha-katuv reader must — goaded on by the very phrasing of Scripture itself — tease out of the text. The superfluous phrase is in your land from Leviticus 22:24. The Art Scroll editors are not, of course, engaged in supporting any claims of this book nor do they employ the ha-katuv terminology as it is being used in this book. But their footnote [# 36] on page 14b-iv nicely unpacks the de facto ha-katuv principle used by ben Zoma in making this unpopular decision.

There is a paradox involved all of this. In those ha-katuv debates — a frame of reference not dependent on the alleged Oral Torah tradition invented by the Pharisees — the rulings of Ishmael ((who championed the orthodox Scripture-based plain-sense orientation of the ha-katuv principles> manner of interpreting Biblical mitsvot which principles reigned as normative in the first twenty-five years of the Rabbinic Movement after the destruction of the Temple)) tended towards leniency. In contrast, Aqiba’s manipulative usage of alleged ha-katuv principles [[i.e., his idiosyncratic and manipulative reading devices not at all in keeping with the Ishmaelic spirit of the ha-katuv orientation]] were usually on the side of strictness (particularly towards women) and, as well, put in the service of giving Biblical support to Oral Law traditions through such tortured readings which opposed the plain-sense reading. But ben Zoma’s apparently valid usage of ha-katuv principles leads to an onerous situation for Jews living in urban centers in the Land of Israel. And that’s the paradox.

I do not know what Rabbi Ishmael’s own ka katuv reading on this halakhic matter was or even if such was ever recorded in the extant materials. But at least in appearance Ben Zoma’s adjudication of this halakhic matter seems to cast the disciple as going in a direction contrary to the usual practice of his mentor (at least with regard to stringency and leniency). In any case, it is not a stretch to suggest that this insertion by the anonymous narrator of this portion of the Bavli Gemara is offering, to the reader attuned to argumentation by indirection, a reason why — well before the encounter between Joshua and ben Zoma actually occurred — there was an aura of strangeness hanging over this figure which made him more vulnerable than most to the kind of attack on him perpetrated by Rabbi Joshua in his zeal to discredit the main players of the other faction.

b). The second halakhic matter presented to ben Zoma — perhaps, as we shall see, with the intent of putting him in a foolish light but also of portraying ben Zoma as sympathetic with something which had become anathema to the Rabbinic Movement at that time — concerns itself with whether or not a virgin [in the full technical sense of maintaining hymeneal integrity] can become pregnant. Oh yes. To deflect away from the obvious reference involved in the question, the matter is immediately hooked to the prohibition of the Kohen Gadol to marry anyone who is not a virgin in the technical sense.

In a somewhat ribald manner, we get the famous — and oft-repeated in Rabbinic literature — amazing skill claimed by Shmuel* to be able (by virtue of a peculiar skill relative to the angle of penetration) to have intercourse many times with a virgin partner without destroying her hymeneal integrity. But this possible explanation is dismissed by ben Zoma because the halakhah cannot be based on an uncommon situation. So the distractive case of Shmuel having been dismissed by ben-Zoma , the technical possibility is raised by ben Zoma that perhaps the pregnancy resulted from the equally famous and legendary still-fertile seminal emission left in a bathtub or enclosed bathing area. This, basically humorous, possibility — which at least theoretically entertains the virtually impossible possibility of becoming pregnant in this manner — continues to be attached to the "prop" of the Kohen Gadol is kicked about more or less indecisively. But by now it has become clear that the eliciting of a final halakhic ruling is not at issue and never was it an issue from the beginning. It turns out that there is no ruling forthcoming on the halakhic prop question (i.e., how this situation would pertain to the marriage intentions of a Kohen Gadol) at all.

I suggest that there was probably a scene — and probably orchestrated to portray ben Zoma in a bad light from the Rabbinic point of view — involving not the prop matter of the Kohen Gadol but rather the more famous question of whether a virgin — in whose name hymeneal integrity was famously argued for — <> could get pregnant. In the first place, by dismissing the famed Shmuel method as not having standing in determining this halakhic matter ben Zoma loses the opportunity to impugn the behavior and character of the only-technical virgin. Then, by bringing in the at least technical (but for the most part discredited by virtually everyone) and virtually impossible possibility that such a virgin was impregnated by a still-fertile seminal emission left in a bathtub or enclosed bathing area, ben Zoma may have given the impression of giving support to that famous story of the young maiden from Nazareth.

Was ben Zoma just being precise and raising all the possibilities irrespective of the famous case being deflectedly alluded to? That seems likely since ben Zoma was very assiduous in matters of halakhah , even when being such had the unhappy effect of going against what was popular. Did such give rise to the view that ben Zoma was somehow associated with the now-discredited residue of the Jamesian minut? <> One doesn’t know. It seems most unlikely that a disciple of Rabbi Ishmael would have leanings in that direction. It was Rabbi Aqiba who was more noted for his infatuation with Jesus as a Messiah figure. To the extent that there is ANY foundation for this alleged second halakhic example it would seem that we simply have ben Zoma being true to his halakhic assiduousness even at the expense of going contrary to popular opinion.

Nor do we get any help on this matter from those transmissions in the name of the son of ben-Zoma. Those transmissions spoken of above did not touch on this matter. In any case it seems that this miniature vignette, disguised as an halakhic encounter, suggests that ben Zoma had the reputation of at least raising the possibility of credibility for certain phenomena (so as to give whatever case which was under discussion a meticulously fair hearing) which phenomena seemed to advertise their lack of credibility. As I said, an aura of strangeness about this figure, even before the encounter with Rabbi Joshua. He was a vulnerable figure and Joshua made effective use of this vulnerability.

*. [My presumption is that the usage of Shmuel without further specification must be a reference to the famous Shmuel who is often paired off — with regard to halakhic disputation — with Rav in Babylonia. If so, it would have been impossible, chronologically, for either ben Zoma or those questioning him to have raised the matter of Shmuel’s special capacity. This in turn could be a hint by the anonymous narrator of this alleged halakhic encounter that in fact the alleged encounter (i.e., this second allegedly halakhic matter) could never have taken place at all. Such would be an indirect suggestion by our anonymous final editors that slander and calumny were used by those who wished to discredit the major players associated with that Aristocratic troika who — de facto but without halakhic formalization — led the Rabbinic Movement in that first quarter of a century after the destruction of the Temple: Rabbi Ishmael, Eliezer ben Hyrkanus, and John Tsakkai.

The only other Schmuel that I have been able to identify as one who, chronologically, could have been referred to in this alleged halakhic encounter is Shmuel ha-Katan. But that would seem to raise a ribald question different from the one de facto raised.]

A-2. The Accounting of the encounter between Joshua and ben Zoma as given in Genesis Rabbah 2-4.

It once happened that Simeon b. Zoma was standing wrapped in speculation, when R. Joshua passed and greeted him once and a second time, without his answering him. At the third time he [ben Zoma] answered him [Joshua] in confusion.

What does this mean, ben Zoma! exclaimed he [Joshua]: whence are the feet? From nowhere, Rabbi replied he [ben Zoma]. I call on Heaven and Earth to witness that I will not stir hence until you inform me whence are the feet" he [Joshua] urged.

Pause. We are on page 18 of Soncino. The translation has only been very slightly modified.

The Bavli was indirectly calling to memory this version of the encounter found in Genesis Rabbah by having Joshua ask of ben Zoma a question which resonates with Ben Zoma’s out-of-context question as he came out of his trance. Joshua’s question (from the Bavli) was: whence and whither? Ben Zoma’s out-of-context question (from Genesis Rabbah) was: whence are