Nehar Deah

Behar

The Secret of the Sabbatical Cycles and the New Cosmogony

Among the statutes mentioned in the Torah portion of “Behar”, it is written: “Six years you will sew your fields and six years you will prune your vineyards and you will gather your produce. And in the seventh year there shall be a Sabbath of rest for the land, a Sabbath to God” (Vayikra 25:3-4). These simple verses, which talk about the laws of the Shmita (Sabbatical Year) became verses filled with the deepest secrets, in the eyes of thinkers and Kabbalists from the eleventh to the fifteenth century.

Rabbi Avraham ibn Ezra (the Ra’ava), who lived in eleventh century Spain, wrote: “and the secret of the days of the universe are hinted at in this place” (in his commentary on Vayikra 25:2). What is this “secret of the days of the universe” that is hinted at in this verse? Rabbi Moshe ben Nachman (the Ramban), who lived in Gerona in Spain in the thirteenth century, expanded this idea in his own commentary on the verse. According to a tradition he follows, the six years of agricultural work and the sabbatical year at their conclusion, hint at the six days of creation and the Sabbath day. Already in his commentary on the book of Bereishit (2:3) the Ramban reveals his viewpoint, that the six days of creation and the Sabbath day hint at the fact that the world will exist for six thousand years, while the seventh millennium will be in parallel to the Sabbath day which is sanctified to God. This idea of six thousand years of history appears already in the Babylonian Talmud: “Rav Katina says: six thousand years the world will be and one in a state of destruction” (Sanhedrin 97a), meaning - the world will exist for six thousand years and then will be in a state of destruction for one thousand years and then it will reach its required state.

The Ramban, however, says more than this. In his opinion, in addition to the fact that one Sabbatical cycle of seven years hints, as stated, to the cycle of our history, which is six thousand years, he also states that the seven Sabbatical cycles in the Jubilee cycle, are parallel to “all the days of the universe”. According to the Ramban, every universe, such as ours, will exist for seven thousand years; there will be seven such universes and after them the great Jubilee will take place, a redemption of all the universes. This theory, known to researchers as the “Theory of the Sabbatical Cycles”, assumes that our universe is not the only universe; there were universes that preceded it and there will be universes after it. The fact that there were universes before ours is told of already in the Midrash: “Rabbi Ahavu said, teaching that [God] creates worlds and destroys them until he created these. He said, these are useful to me and these are not useful to me” (Bereishit Rabbah 3:7). Even though the Ra’ava hinted at this idea, and even though the idea of 49,000 years of the universe is mentioned in the “Sefer Megillat haMegaleh” (The Book of the Revealing Scroll) of Rabbi Avraham bar Chiyya (written in 1125), the “Theory of the Sabbatical Cycles” crystallized specifically among the Kabbalists of Gerona, lead by Rabbi Ezra and his student, the Ramban.

Rabbi Yitzchak of Acco (Acre), a student of the Ramban who commonly explained his writings with respect to mystical concepts, expanded on the topic of the secret of the Sabbatical Cycle in his book “Meirat Einayim” (Illuminating the Eyes). Rabbi Yitzchak sees every 50,000 years of the universe as one continuous and ongoing process, even though it is divided into seven universes, and the Talmudic expression “and one in a state of destruction” he takes to refer only to life on the planet earth, but the planet itself will not be destroyed. Rabbi Menachem Recanati, a fourteenth century Italian Kabbalist, explains similarly (in his work “Sefer Levush Aur Akarut”). In his opinion, only in the Great Jubilee, and not in every Sabbatical, does everything returns to nothingness. Therefore, what is the difference between a 7000 year old world and a the world that will come thereafter? According to Recanati there will be some form of advancement between them. In every world “the will be a positive addition and blessed influence from the preceding [world]”.

Recanati also teaches us that there were Kabbalists who opposed the “Theory of the Sabbatical Cycles”: “While I did find that for some of the later Kabbalists, their opinions do not completely agree with what I wrote, because it is difficult for them that for Israel the messianic times would be such a short period, less that a thousand years, and it is known that the days of tranquility should be a thousand times more than the days of strife caused by the nations, that we suffered in order to sanctify the lofty and blessed Name [of God]“. It seems that the problem that these Kabbalists had was a question of logic. How could it be that the reward, the messianic times, would be shorter in length than the times of strife? Also we can question this view on a biblical basis. If the world will be totally destroyed in the Great Jubilee, after 49,0000 years, how can we explain the words of Kohelet (Ecclesiastes) that “the world will stand forever”, a verse from which the Rambam (Maimonides) learns that the cosmos will not be destroyed (Guide to the Perplexed, Part 2, 27)? This topic was dealt with, in his commentary on our verse, by Rabbeinu Bechai ben Asher, who lived in the fourteenth century and was a student of the Rashba and from the same circles as the Ramban. He understood the words of Kohelet like those who say that the earth will only stand “le’olam” [Translators note: this Hebrew word is normally taken to mean “for eternity” but literally means “till the (end of the) world”, that is for the duration of the world of the jubilee, which is 50,000 years.

The “Theory of the Sabbatical Cycles” continued with various philosophers and was mentioned in the writings of those expelled from Spain (such as Don Yitzchak Abarbanel and Rabbi Yehuda Chayyat), until it reached the sages of Tzfat (Safed) in the sixteenth century. The Ramak (Rabbi Moshe Cordovero) related to it ambivalently, while the Ari (Rabbi Yitzchak Luria) disagreed with even its basic tenets and claimed that there were no worlds before ours and their will be none after ours. In his opinion, the entire “Theory of the Sabbatical Cycles” is fundamentally flawed, since the entire tradition of the shmittot (sabbatical years) deals with spiritual worlds that came before our world and not with physical worlds. As a result of the Ari’s words, Kabbalists generally steered clear of the “Theory of the Sabbatical Cycles”.

In the last 150 years we have begun to see a revival of the theory and this is due to the necessity of dealing with modern scientific systems relating to the creation of the world and the length of its existence. In his discussion “Derush Aur HaChayyim” (Homily on the Light of Life) which debates the eternality of the soul, Rabbi Yisrael Lipschitz of Danzig, who lived in the nineteenth century, in his commentary “Tiferet Yisrael” (The Glory of Israel) on the Mishna, that all the scientific findings with respect to the skulls of primitive men, giant elephants and other prehistoric animals, are all evidence of a world that preceded ours, a world that was destroyed before ours. Rabbi A.I. Kook goes even further and explains according to the system of Rabbi Yitzchak of Acco, that “one in a state of destruction” means the destruction of humans and animals and not the destruction of the earth: “If this is so, those [archaeological] excavation show us, that there existed [before our world] periods of creatures, including people, but [to say that] there was not a total destruction between them, and a new creation, on this there is no proof, rather hairs floating in the air [=all is speculation”]” (Letters of Rabbi A.I. Kook, Page 105). Rabbi Kook explains, that in the world that preceded ours, there were prehistoric people and animals, but since then this world has been destroyed (the ice age?) and new life began. Rabbi Kook also does not reject the idea that the earth is billions of years old, but he declares that the number of years that Judaism holds by (e.g. 5761 = 1999/2000) began only with the creation of a thinking man (homo sapiens).

The “Theory of the Sabbatical Cycles” allowed a recalculation of the age of the earth, since it talks of a world that preceded ours. Despite the fact that we normally speak of a total of 49,000 years, there are Kabbalists who concluded that after every 50,000 years of the Great Jubilee, there will be an additional jubilee. Rabbeinu Bechayy spoke of eighteen such jubilees, and according to “Sefer Hatemunah”, a Kabbalistic composition from the Gerona school of Kabbalists, there will be 50,000 Jubilees and this means that the world will exist for 2500,000,000 years.

Can we begin to speak of a lessening of the gap between these thinkers and those who hold by modern geological and cosmogonical approaches? And what is the future of the “Theory of the Sabbatical Cycles”? Will they speak in the future of Energy Universes of antimatter that preceded ours or will they compare the “Theory of the Sabbatical Cycles” to the Theory of the Contracting Universe that modern scientific thinkers hold by? Time will tell.

Dr Raphael Shuchat
Dean of Students - Hecht Synagogue

They Ways of the Midrash - Mount Sinai and the Sabbatical

There is a well known question from the Sages: “What is the issue of the Sabbatical doing together with Mount Sinai?” (Safra, Behar, 1), a question based on the opening verses of the Torah portion of “Behar”: “And God said to Moses on Mount Sinai saying … when you come to the land that I give you and the last will rest a Sabbath to God” (Vayikra 25:1-2). Since all the commandments were given to Moses at Sinai, why here specifically is it mentioned that the principle of the Sabbatical Year was given at Sinai? In other words: what can we learn from the fact that the Torah mentions “Mount Sinai” here, with no apparent reason? And from here the use that is made of the question “What is the issue of the Sabbatical doing together with Mount Sinai?” in every case that the narrator wishes to point out two issue which stand side by side, where the connection between them needs to be clarified.

This question is characteristic to one of the methods by which the Sages interpreted the Bible: “Smichut Parshiyot” (Proximity of Issues). Behind this interpretive method lies the belief that the Bible is not a random and disordered collection of verses, chapters and issues, but rather a divine creation and therefore there is also meaning to the proximity of issues. The Sages therefore say that when reading the Bible one must also look at the additional meaning which arises from the connection between a verse and that which follows it, the connection between one commandment and another close to it, between two psalm or two stories. This method of exegesis is found hundreds of times throughout the literature of the Sages and in most cases they contain special literary idioms, such as “what does the issue of X have to do with Y” or “why are these found in close proximity”. Sometimes these explanations seem to follow exactly the simple meaning of the text, but in many cases it is clear that the intention is to use them to give expression to the world of the philosophy and dogma of the Sages, in terms of both homiletic and Halacha (Jewish Law). Here are two simple examples of interpretation based on “Smichut Parshiyot”:

(A) “Rabbi [Yehuda Hanasi] says, why is the issue of the Nazarite found in close proximity with the issue of the “Sotah” (suspected adulteress) - to tell you that anyone who sees a Sotah in her disgrace will be careful to stay away from wine” (Babylonian Talmud, 63a). Chapter 5 of the book of Bamidbar deals with the issue of the Sotah, whose husband suspects that she has betrayed him. In order to validate his suspicion, or invalidate it, so as to put the husband’s mind at rest, the woman is brought to the priest who evaluates her behavior through a complex and detailed ceremony, which eventually shows whether there was any truth to the husband’s suspicions and if so “this woman will bear her sin” (verse 31). Immediately afterwards the Torah begins to deal with the question of a person who of his own free will accepts upon himself the burden of the Nazarite oath, which has as its fundamental principle the abstention from wine (verse 31). Rabbi Yehuda Hanasi learns, from the proximity between the story of the Sotah and the issue of the Nazarite, that wine was the main cause for the behavior of the Sotah, and therefore it is preferable to abstain from drinking it.

(B) The Midrash (Bereishit Rabbah 58:5) learns from the proximity of the story of the Akeida (binding) of Isaac (Bereishit 22) to the story of the death of Sarah (ibid, 23), that Sarah died due to her distress over what happened at the Akeida, and “therefore the Akeida and ‘and the life of Sarah was’ [first words of the story of her death] were placed in close proximity”.

Characters - The Ramban

Rabbi Moshe ben Nahman, the Ramban, was born in Gerona in Spain in 1194 and died in Acre in 1270. The Ramban deal with a wide variety of areas, but mainly with commentary on the Bible and Talmud, passing religious legislature, composing liturgical poetry and with Kabala (Jewish mysticism), however most of his income came from his work as a doctor. As well as his literary activities the Ramban also was involved in Jewish public life and as the representative of the Jews before the foreign rulers. In 1263 the King of Aragon, James I, forced a public disputation between the Ramban and apostate Jew by the name of Pablo Christiani. The apostate wanted to prove, that along with words of condemnation against Christianity and its messiah, in the literature of the Sages there are also hints and textual support for the validity of Christianity and thereby an admission that Jesus is the messiah that has already come to the world. Against Pablo stood the Ramban, to whom the king promised complete freedom of speech, and he publicly defended the Jewish faith, while disproving, one at a time, each of the claims made by Pablo. The disputation continued for four days and terminated without reaching any clear conclusion. During the disputation the king and the heads of the Franciscan and Dominican Orders were present. As a result of the disputation the priests, who had themselves invited him, claimed that the Ramban had insulted Christianity and its holy men and they presented to the king a letter from the Pope, Clement IV, in which he demanded that the king punish the Ramban. Due to this, the Ramban fled to the land of Israel. Initially he settled in Acre but later moved up to Jerusalem. In a letter he sent to his son, the Ramban expressed his disappointment at the lowly state of the Jewish community that he found in Jerusalem. In order to help rehabilitate the Jerusalemite community, the Ramban opened a synagogue there, and probably also a yeshiva (place of Jewish learning), and afterwards returned to Acre, where he died at the age of 76. We have various literary traditions as to his burial place, with Haifa, Acre, Hebron and Jerusalem all vying for this honor.

The Ramban’s commentary on the Torah was written mainly in Spain, close to his arrival in Israel, and while settled in Israel he expanded it slightly. His commentary is linguistically lengthy and extensive and much time is devoted to the contexts of Biblical passages and their meanings. Often the commentary is has two levels: one that relates to the readily apparent literal meaning and another that focuses on the mystical (in the spirit of the Spanish Kabalistic thinkers that the Ramban associated himself with). The Ramban frequently quotes from the Sages, but he does not follow them blindly and examines their words and the degree to which they fit the literal meaning of the text. Therefore, more than once, the Ramban quotes Rashi or Ibn Ezra, and even though he relates to them respectfully, he does not hesitate to disagree with them. The Ramban is also unique in that he is likely to voice criticism of the forefathers of the nation. For example, he says with respect to the story of Abraham and Sarah going down to Egypt, during which he presents Sarah as his sister and due to this is taken to Pharaoh’s palace: “And know that Abraham sinned a great sin unintentionally in that he brought his righteous wife to the stumbling block of sin because he feared that they would kill him … [and] also his leaving the land … due to the famine was a transgression that he sinned, because in a famine God will redeem him from death, and for this sin his descendants were condemned to exile in Egypt by the hand of Pharaoh” (Bereishit (12:10). Therefore we can clearly see that the Ramban did not was not bothered by the opinions of others.