The teaching of Ben Zoma

Judaism, Wntr, 1993 by Mordecai Roshwald

Both the Greek and the Judaic approaches, as outlined above, imply the elusive nature of wisdom and the effort involved in its pursuit, which make the wise a select group. Aristotle demands a dedication to intellectual activity, which is not likely to be every man's choice. Plato, in The Republic, specifically singles out the philosophers as a very select group of people who dedicate their whole life to their avocation. Indeed, as well known, he entrusts them with the rule of his ideal state, for it is they, and not the common people, who know what is true and what is right, and, thus, are qualified to guide and lead the society and the state. The exhortations of the Sages in Pirke Avot insist on the wisdom of the Torah and on the guidance to this wisdom provided the rabbis. The rabbinical approach to wisdom seems to exclude any alternate avenues, as much as does Plato's view. The road to truth is one, and those who pave it must be recognized and followed. There is authoritative wisdom, and there is no point in looking for enlightenment in other quarters.

Looked at from this perspective, the dictum of Ben Zoma strikes one as odd and eccentric, not to say, outright contradictory. For Ben Zoma's wise man is not one who explores the meaning of the Torah, or follows in the steps of the sages who dedicate their lives to the study of the Torah, but one "who learns from every man." This does not mean, however, that Ben Zoma belittled the Torah and its study and the tradition of learning pursued by the tannaim, of which he, himself, was one. It does mean that Ben Zoma saw importance also in the experience and reflection of ordinary people. The maxim does not contradict the traditional perception about the wisdom of the Torah; it only amplifies it by another source of knowledge derived from common people. Every human being is implicitly assumed to have some kind of wisdom, some true opinion, and the wise man is he who is ready to cull the truth from this wide pool of humanity.

This approach carries two important assumptions or implications. One is of a philosophical nature. It encourages learning based on induction, on the absorption of a wide experience, besides the deductive knowledge arrived at from the interpretation of the Torah. To be sure, the rabbinical tradition in the age of the tannaim and in subsequent centuries was never purely deductive, for the juridical decisions of the rabbis on various actual or theoretical legal issues were often at least partially based on individual judgment, which must have been affected by their experience, and by the facts before them. The rabbis often combined the deductive legal conclusion, derived from a Biblical injunction, with a personal judgment ab aequo et bono. Yet they, almost as a rule, tried to find legitimation in the Holy Scriptures for their legal opinion or adjudication in a specified case, and in this sense were committed to the perception of knowledge and wisdom as being a deductive process. Ben Zoma throws the gate open for the inductive pursuit of knowledge and wisdom through the experience of diverse humanity.