No Excuses in Talmud Torah: Ralbag’s Conclusion to Sefer Bamidbar

Have you ever made excuses for not teaching or learning? I know I have. You know who didn't? The Ralbag, Rambam, Rema, and many others. We can learn from them, and probably should. Today.

Jul 17, 2023

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Unless I’m mistaken, this is an autograph (i.e. handwritten manuscript) of the Rambam’s Commentary on the Mishnah, possibly written under the circumstances described in the article. מאוסף הספרייה הלאומית, The National Library of Israel. "Ktiv" Project, The National Library of Israel

No Excuses in Talmud Torah: Ralbag’s Conclusion to Sefer Bamidbar

Ralbag’s commentary on Sefer Bamidbar is shorter than his commentary on the other four books of Chumash. One might assume this was by happenstance. After all, if you look at any five-volume set of Chumash commentary, you’ll invariably find one volume that’s slimmer than the others. But at the very end of his commentary on Sefer Bamidbar, Ralbag explains why this specific volume didn’t meet his usual standards:

Thus concludes this commentary on this Sefer. We completed it in a very short span of time and without books. For this reason, it will be necessary to go over [and correct] it a second time, with Hashem's decree. It was completed on the 23rd of Teves in the year 5098 (1338 C.E.). Praise be to God Who helped us. Blessed and exalted is He over all blessing and praise. Amen.

The first time I read this, my jaw dropped. If you are familiar with Ralbag’s Chumash [1] commentary, you will appreciate the breadth and depth of knowledge necessary to write such a work. Not only does Ralbag explain the narrative portions of the text in full – typically on three levels: the words, the principles, and the “useful lessons” – but he also delves into the halachic minutiae of each and every mitzvah, citing and synthesizing source after source from the Mishnah, Gemara, Braisos, Sifra, Sifre, Tosefta, Yerushalmi, etc. and, at times, engaging in full-on pilpul (Talmudic dialectics). The thought of writing such a commentary by memory boggles my mind!

Rambam concludes his commentary on the Mishnah (at the end of Seder Taharos) with a similar apology:

We have completed this treatise as we intended it, and I beseech Him, may He be exalted, and plead before Him that He save me from error. But anyone who finds reason to raise a question or believes he has an interpretation of any of the halakhot that is better than mine should so note and judge me favorably, for what I have taken upon myself to do here is no small matter easily discharged by one possessed of righteousness and a good sense of discernment. That is especially so because my heart is often burdened by the troubles of the time and what God has decreed for us with regard to exile and wandering the world from one end to the other; and perhaps we have already received the associated reward, for exile atones for sin. He, may He be exalted, knows I wrote my interpretation of some halakhot while I was journeying on the road, and I listed some of them while I was aboard ship on the Mediterranean Sea.

During this time, Rambam (who was in his twenties) and his fellow Jews were under the harsh persecutions of the Almohad Caliphate. He wasn’t merely “journeying on the road” and “aboard ship” the way we would think of it while writing his commentary. He was fleeing for his life, not knowing exactly where he would end up, or when he might have to flee again, and was exposed to treacherous conditions all along the way.

Likewise, Rema prefaces his Mechir Yayin on Megilas Esther by recounting the circumstances of its composition:

I was in the midst of the exile. We were driven out of our cities in the year 1556 on account of a plague … We were sojourning in a foreign land in the city of Szydlowiec – a place without fig and grapevine (cf. Bamidbar 20:5), with almost no water to drink (ibid.) except through great cunning, a city in which we ate bread in scarcity (cf. Devarim 8:9), without any tree under which to take shelter. We were unable to fulfill the days of Purim with feasting and gladness, to remove sorrow and moaning. I said, "I will arise and rejoice in my work!" “Even [then,] my wisdom remained with me” (Koheles 2:9), for “the ordinances of Hashem are upright, gladdening the heart" (Tehilim 19:9). I took honey and milk under my tongue (cf. Shir ha’Shirim 4:11) and “I set my heart to explore and seek out” (Koheles 1:13) the intent of this megilah, what is signified by its statements and the explanation of each and every word.

Sadly, there are many more examples of chachamim throughout history who wrote works of Torah in dire conditions – from the Shach writing his commentary on Choshen Mishpat while on the run from the murderous Cossacks, to David ha’Melech composing chapters of Tehilim while on the run from enemies who sought his life.

I’m sure there are many lessons one can glean from these cases, but if you read the title of this article, you already know my take-away: there are no excuses in Talmud Torah! [2] These chachamim had ample excuses available to them for NOT undertaking such monumental writing projects: “I didn’t have my books with me,” “I was fleeing for my life,” “We were starving to death.” But they didn’t let these obstacles stand in their way. They did the best they could with the tools they had.

I am reminded of Rabbeinu Bachya ibn Paquda’s recounting of his internal debate about whether to write Chovos ha’Levavos. After identifying several reasons why he felt that he shouldn’t write his book, he realized that he was just making excuses out of a desire to avoid conflict, and that he should force himself to go ahead with the plan:

I knew that many [works of] intelligence were lost due to fear, and many losses were caused by concern. I remembered the saying: "part of caution is not to be overly cautious." I told myself, if every person who ever composed a good work or who ever taught the upright and proper path had waited until all his wishes were fulfilled, no person would have ever uttered a word after the prophets, whom God had chosen as His agents and strengthened with His divine help. If every person who had wished to attain all good qualities but was unable to attain them, had abandoned whatever he could attain of them, then all human beings would be devoid of all good and lacking all excellences. They would have been perpetually pursuing false hopes, the paths of righteousness would have been desolate, and the abodes of kindness abandoned … Therefore, I found myself obligated to force my soul to bear the task of composing this book …

Mishlei 11:24 teaches: "יֵשׁ מְפַזֵּר וְנוֹסָף עוֹד, וְחֹשֵׂךְ מִיֹּשֶׁר אַךְ לְמַחְסוֹר" which conventionally translates to: “There is one who scatters and gathers more, but one who withholds from uprightness will only lack.” The pshat is that if you give generously to tzedakah, your wealth will increase, but if you “withhold from uprightness” – that is, if you refrain from using your money for the upright act of tzedakah – then your wealth will diminish.

We learned this pasuk a different way, translating וְחֹשֵׂךְ מִיֹּשֶׁר as “but one who withholds out of uprightness.” The second half of the pasuk describes someone who insists on only doing tzedakah if it is perfectly upright – given out of pure motives, or in the best halachic manner, or when the money will be put to the best use, or whatever other standard of perfection they insist upon. In contrast, the person in the first half of the pasuk abides by the principle of “don’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good,” and allows himself to give freely and imperfectly. The results speak for themselves: the first person will end up giving a lot more tzedakah than the second person.

What is true for tzedakah of giving out money is true for tzedakah of giving out knowledge. Those who teach in a free and unrestricted manner, in speech or in writing, will benefit themselves and others in innumerable ways, but those who refrain from teaching based on excuses – even legitimate ones – will lose out in their own learning and deprive others of knowledge. “One who waits for the wind will not sow; one who waits for the clouds will not harvest” (Koheles 11:3). And what is true of teaching is even more true of learning. There will ALWAYS be excuses available for NOT learning. The conditions will NEVER be ideal. But if you let that stop you, your learning will suffer.

The moral of the story is that if you’re waiting for the perfect conditions to write, to teach, or to learn – stop waiting, and just do it. Even if the Almohads are hot on your trail. There are no excuses in talmud Torah.

[1] Ralbag’s Chumash commentary specifically. His Nach commentaries are great, but they are nowhere near on the level of his Chumash commentary. For more information, check out my shiur entitled, Torah as Regimen: Ralbag’s Approach to Chumash.

[2] This should be read/shouted in the voice of Tom Hanks’s character from A League of their Own. Ve’ha’mevin yavin.

What struggles have you had with these types of excuses? What have you learned about yourself in your efforts to overcome them? Let me know in the comments!

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