Q&A: The “ets” in the Torah and the Temple
The “ets” in the Torah and the Temple.
Question
Hello Rabbi,
1. When you think about it, the whole Israelite way of life centered around Temple worship, as the Torah envisions it, is completely disconnected from reality today. All the Temple commandments revolve around agriculture and livestock—things that made up a person’s entire life in ancient times, but are meaningless for a person of our generation. Take, for example, first-fruits: in the past, the first fruit would bring great excitement to the owner of the field, and the ascent to the Temple expressed that. By contrast, today they would sell first-fruits baskets the way they sell the four species in the cities—that is, disconnected from the character of the commandment. Not to mention the huge slaughterhouse that the Temple would be, which would look unpleasant to a modern person—blood up to the knees, etc.
2. Will there be an obligation to build the Third Temple according to the model in the book of Ezekiel?
3. How did that tanna there (I forgot his name) expound all the occurrences of “et” in the Torah? After all, that is not part of the methods of exposition, and that is proven by the fact that he later withdrew from it.
Answer
1. It is possible that you are right, and the future Sanhedrin will cancel or change this. Rabbi Kook writes that in the future there will be no animal sacrifices. One could expand that and say there will be no sacrifices at all. We may do kapparot with money instead of chickens.
2. I don’t know. When we get there, we’ll talk.
3. It is indeed part of the methods of exposition, according to Rabbi Akiva. You are familiar with the methods of exposition of Rabbi Ishmael. I have written at length about Shimon HaAmsuni in several places (try searching the site), and I explained the whole move there. He reconstructs methods of exposition that were given at Sinai, and the dispute is about the reconstruction.
Discussion on Answer
The Torah is not supposed to be expounded according to the “plain meaning of the words,” because then it would be plain meaning, not exposition.
This is a topic that requires a lengthy discussion. You can read in my books on the principle of general and particular (the second in the Talmudic Logic series), and also in The Spirit of Law (the fourth in my quartet).
At the moment I remembered that I also touched on this here:
If we’re talking here about sacrifices and that sort of thing, I was interested to ask: what does a person who is disgusted by meat do—how would he eat the Passover sacrifice?
What is the point of the Temple without the altar of sacrifices and blood? After all, its blood stands in place of my blood.
3. The Torah is supposed to be expounded according to the plain meaning of the words, not according to occurrences of “et” and decorative crowns.
And even if methods of exposition were missing for us until Rabbi Akiva came and reconstructed them, then there is a problem of tradition, and I would be glad if the Rabbi would point out here one example of such a reconstruction and its effect on the commandments.