I HAPPEN TO THINK SHAMAI, Hillel’s partner, gets a raw deal from the rabbis.
In Avot, Shamai gets one line that includes
(Receive everyone with a cheerful face)
compared to Hillel’s many.
WHAT PROMPTS THIS umbrage?
Jos. Teluskin’s book Jewish Wisdom; specifically a discussion about commenting on a bride’s appearance. (Page 59).
Hillel’s school contends that even if the bride looks like something from a horror movie, the guests should describe her as a “beautiful and graceful bride.”
Shamai said describe her as she is.
(Babylonian Talmud 16b-17a)
Let’s consider.
The bride knows she is no beauty queen. Telling her she is “beautiful and graceful” obviously is insulting and hurtful to the bride. She knows better and she knows she's being lied to.
Teluskin’s book suggests, citing Tosafot, that Shamai probably intended to find something to praise about the bride — her eyes, her hands, her disposition.
That doesn’t satisfy Teluskin. He insists that “if instead of praising the brides overall beauty (which by all preceding accounts is a falsehood), praising one feature simply points out the ugliness of her other features."
For Shamai, it is a no win situation.
Putting down Shamai seems to be a major sport among the rabbis, both modern and not-so-modern.
Yet if anyone studies Shamai, they are likely to be disabused of that opinion.
Almost everyone knows the story of the heathen who insisted that Shamai teach him Torah while the heathen stood on one foot.
Shamai chased the man way. Shamai would not cheapen the Torah that way, and the heathen was impudent — at least in Shamai’s mind — to make such a demand.
Hillel, as we are told, accepted the heathen and told him not to do to his fellowman what he would not have done to himself. The rest is commentary; go study.
Did the heathen “go study?” Your guess is as good as mine, but I lean toward “no, he did not go study.”
Why, incidentally did Hillel use the negative approach: “Don’t do anything...”? It generally is believed it is easier NOT to do something than it is to DO something — except of course when it comes to eating desserts, when it can be very hard to not do something.
Shamai may have been a feminist. At least some of his decisions were pro-women.
Jewish Women's Archive
(http://tinyurl.com/yc4h2hzr)
Bet Shammai views women as autonomous individuals possessing equal personal status, while Bet Hillel disregards women’s personal status.
Gittin 90a-b: Grounds for Divorce (http://tinyurl.com/ybnwpsy9)
Beit Shammai rules that a man can divorce his wife only if he found a devar erva – a promiscuous situation.
Beit Hillel permits divorce even in a case where the wife hikdihah tavshilo (literally “burned his food”).
Rabbi Akiva says that he can divorce her for any reason – even if he found another woman who he finds more attractive.
I don’t doubt that Shamai was the stricter of the pair. Fathers often are stricter with their children than the children’s mother, but does that mean the father loves his children less? It may be he loves them more and wants to protect them from whatever dangers threaten. The children just may not realize it at the time.
If I was to put them into today’s terms, Hillel is ADL; Shamai is JDL.
Hillel would have been in Ben Gurion’s camp; Shamai in Began’s. (Remember who made the first peace deal?)
It takes all kinds — the Hillels and the Shamais — and Jews should learn more about these personalities before making blanket statements: Hillel was good; Shamai was bad.
That’s akin to the current politics in both the U.S. and Israel. Blinded by stupidity, neither the left nor the right can see any virtue in the other — to the detriment of the nations.
Shamai was not always the “bad guy,” nor was Hillel always the “good guy.”
Now if the rabbis will realize that, and treat Shamai with the respect due him, I’d be a happy camper.
* The Jewish Virtual Library (http://tinyurl.com/y8y8757t) sums up Hillel and Shamai in a short paragraph:
Both (Hillel and Shamai) lived during the reign of King Herod (37-4 BCE), an oppressive period in Jewish history because of the Roman occupation of the Land of Israel. Shamai was concerned that if Jews had too much contact with the Romans, the Jewish community would be weakened, and this attitude was reflected in his strict interpretation of Jewish law. Hillel did not share Shamai's fear and therefore was more liberal in his view of law.
Is there a modern comparison? The Romans are gone, but Jews still are tempted by the non-Jewish world.
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