Rabbi Akiba's Crowns: Postmodern Discourse and the Cost of Rabbinic Reading

Judaism, Fall, 2000 by Laurence L. Edwards

The past carries with it a temporal index by which it is referred to redemption. There is a secret agreement between past generations and the present one. Our coming was expected on earth. Like every generation that preceded us, we have been endowed with a weak Messianic power, a power to which the past has a claim. That claim cannot be settled cheaply. [1]

A FAMOUS STORY IN THE TALMUD DESCRIBES A VISIT BY Moses to the classroom of Rabbi Akiba (second century C.E.). It is often used to explain, in a playful and fanciful way, how the oral tradition was authorized alongside the written Torah. Often it is reported without its rather dark conclusion, and it is seldom examined in the context of the passage in which it appears. The intent of this essay is to examine this story in some detail, to show how it functions in its immediate context, and to bring it into dialogue with some more recent approaches to questions of interpretation.

The rabbis of the Talmud thought of their work as a continuation of the work of Moses (whom they anachronistically called Rabbenu, "Our Rabbi," retrospectively making him one of them), but they did not consider themselves prophets. Their great achievement was the production, compilation, and redaction of a discourse that ranged over virtually every aspect of ritual and ethics, law and philosophy, science and folklore. They enabled the continuation of Jewish life and religious practice in radically changed circumstances, including the physical exile of most Jews from the Land of Israel and the absence of the cultic center of the Temple. Their work comes down to us in the form of collections of midrash and in the volumes of the Mishnah and Talmud.

In closing the biblical canon, the rabbis of the Talmud declared the era of prophecy to be over. They knew themselves to be heirs of the prophets, but understood that their work took on a different character. According to Michael Fishbane, "Pharisaic Judaism tried to minimize the gap between a divine Torah and ongoing human interpretation by projecting the origins of authoritative exegesis to Sinai itself. But even this mythification of a chain of legitimate interpreters did not so much obscure the distinction between Revelation and Interpretation as underscore it." [2] The rabbis, inheritors of the Pharisaic traditions, were aware of both a continuity and a radical discontinuity between themselves and their predecessors, an awareness of which they sometimes allow us a glimpse.

They not only codified rules of behavior, but equally preserved the texture of their arguments, including dissenting opinions. The style of the Talmud thus shares with postmodernity a certain resistance to the unifying impulse characteristic of modern discourse. [3] Although they excluded some important voices, they did accomplish what Moshe Halbertal calls "the codification of controversy." [4]

The Text

Among the Tannaim, the generations of rabbinic teachers whose work is recorded in the Mishnah, Rabbi Akiba is generally considered the towering personality. Approximately one hundred years after his death, a legend is reported by R. Judah bar Ezekiel (219-299 C.E.), in the name of his teacher and sometime traveling companion, Ray: [5]

Rav Judah said in the name of Rav, When Moses ascended on high he found the Holy One of Blessing, engaged in affixing coronets to the letters. [6] Said Moses, "Lord of the Universe, Who stays your hand?" He answered, "There will arise a man, at the end of many generations, Akiba b. Joseph by name, who will expound upon each tittle heaps and heaps of laws." "Lord of the Universe," said Moses; "permit me to see him." He replied, "Turn around." Moses went and sat down behind eight rows [and listened to the discourses upon the law]. Not being able to follow their arguments he was ill at ease, but when they came to a certain subject and the disciples said to the master "Whence do you know it?" and the latter replied "It is a law given to Moses at Sinai" he was comforted. Thereupon he returned to the Holy One of Blessing, and said, "Lord of the Universe, you have such a man and you give the Torah by me!" He replied, "Be silent, for such is my decree." Then said Moses, "Lord of the Universe, you have shown me his To rah, show me his reward." "Turn around," said He; and Moses turned around and saw them weighing out his flesh at the market-stalls. "Lord of the Universe," cried Moses, "such Torah, and such a reward!" He replied, "Be silent, for such is my decree." [7]

This brief narrative of Moses visiting the classroom of Rabbi Akiba is a favorite citation of many scholars as an illustration of the weight given to interpretation in rabbinic tradition. [8] The story can be read in support of the continuity of tradition: everything that scholars will interpret in the future was already contained in the revelation given to Moses at Sinai. At the same time it dramatically complicates the rabbis' view of their work and demonstrates that the rabbis were not naive in understanding their project. The Talmud here imagines a situation in which Moses is unable to comprehend a discussion of the Oral Torah even though, according to various other talmudic statements, the Oral Torah also was revealed to him at Sinai. [9]