Silver Jubilee of Mishkan Yisrael – 5769

With God’s help

What Does Sisyphus Have to Do with Time-Bound Positive Commandments?

Introduction

Marking a silver jubilee, like any year along the axis of history of a people or of any group, is a point of conclusion but also a point of beginning. Every New Year constitutes the end of the previous year and the beginning of the new year. On our circular axis of time, every end is a new beginning, and every beginning is an end.

This connection between end and beginning, and vice versa, is necessary in a finite world. Every finite entity has an edge, and when one reaches the edge there is nowhere further to continue.[1] In a finite world every entity is finite, and therefore necessarily has edges as well. The only possibility of infinity within a finite framework is the circle.

At first glance it seems that, in the overall movement, we are circling endlessly on the same axis of time and retracing our steps from the previous cycle. But that is not the whole picture. The axis of time has two components: a linear component, which advances from past to future, and a circular component, which repeats itself throughout the calendar year (and also the day and the month). The conclusion is that the entire axis of time is built like a spiral, whose projections are the two components mentioned above (the linear and the circular). We will illustrate this through the halakhic aspects of these two axes of time.

Two Axes of Time

The circular axis of time is defined over the span of jubilee, Sabbatical year, year, month, week, or day. Commandments connected to this axis of time are called time-bound positive commandments. They return to us with varying periodicity, depending on the length of the relevant cycle. Festivals return every year, the Sabbatical year every seven years, the jubilee every fifty years, the New Moon every month, and prayers every week or day. There are also things that recur twice a day (the daily offerings, the recitation of the Shema, the lighting of the menorah, and so on).

It can be shown that the essence of time-bound positive commandments is that time itself causes them, and not any circumstances that occur in time (see the responsa Avnei Nezer, Orah Hayyim no. 384, and Seridei Esh, vol. II, Yoreh De’ah no. 90). This halakhic definition has a practical implication: women are exempt from them.

By contrast, there is a time-axis of a different character: the linear, or historical, axis. Such time does not repeat itself. It may be the life-course of an individual, of a group, of a people, or of the world as a whole. There are commandments that are connected specifically to this axis of time. For example, with respect to the individual there is the commandment of redeeming the firstborn son (for a firstborn), or circumcision (for every male).[2]

In this context an interesting question arises. The Talmud in tractate Kiddushin discusses the father’s obligations toward his son, and one of them is to circumcise him. The mother, by contrast, is not obligated in the circumcision of her sons. The Talmud (ibid., 29a) derives this from a verse: as God commanded him ("as God commanded him"; Genesis 21), him ("him") and not her. Rashi there (s.v. From where do we derive this?) writes that this is a positive commandment that is not time-bound, and therefore a special source is needed to exempt the mother from this commandment. But Tosafot (s.v. him) in fact ask why such a source is needed; after all, this is a commandment that depends on time, since the obligation of circumcision begins from the age of eight days and onward. Several medieval authorities raise this difficulty, and they offer a number of answers. Tosafot there answer as follows: Since from the eighth day onward it has no interruption, it is not time-bound. ("since from the eighth day onward there is no interruption, it is not time-bound").

One can understand the words of Tosafot on a technical plane: a time-bound positive commandment is only a commandment that is bounded on the time-axis from both sides. This is a technical distinction, and it is not clear why it is actually correct. Therefore it seems to me that the more plausible understanding is that Tosafot mean to say that a commandment which essentially belongs to the linear axis of time (and not the circular one) does not enter the category of time-bound positive commandments at all. This is a different axis of time, and with respect to it this rule was never stated.[3]

Maimonides, in his third principle, rules that positive commandments stated only for a particular occasion are not to be counted. For example, the commandment to make a bronze serpent, or to place manna in a jar, which Israel was commanded in the wilderness. In positive commandment 187 Maimonides counts the commandment to blot out the memory of Amalek. He raises there a difficulty: ostensibly, this commandment does not apply for future generations, since Amalek has vanished from the world, and therefore we ought not to have counted it. Maimonides explains that the commandment applies for generations, but it is Amalek that disappeared. That is, the problem is technical and not essential. The principled scope of the commandment is indeed eternal; only the accidental circumstances are such that we have no way to implement it. Such commandments are certainly counted.

This determination raises the question why the jar of manna, or the bronze serpent, are not commandments of that sort. Under those circumstances, if they were indeed to occur and materialize once again in the course of history, the reasons for carrying them out would exist, and it is therefore reasonable to assume that in such a situation the commandment would once again apply to us. The fact that such circumstances will not recur later in history is accidental rather than essential, precisely like the disappearance of Amalek.

From Maimonides’ words it emerges that even if the circumstances were to recur, the obligation would not be repeated. The reason is that what generates the obligation is time itself, and that does not recur. It follows from Maimonides that there are commandments that are intrinsically one-time obligations (not because of the circumstances). Their principled applicability is temporary, and not only the circumstances of the obligation. If so, these are commandments that time itself causes (as we saw above), and therefore they are temporary in essence. Except that these commandments are caused by linear time and not circular time. Parallel commandments of this sort, which are generated by circumstances that depend on circular time, will certainly be counted in the enumeration of the commandments (such as the festivals, or the recitation of the Shema, and the like), since they recur with each completion of such a circle.

The conclusion is, then, that the Torah’s axis of time is composed of two different components: the linear and the circular. Each of us lives within several different circles of the kind listed above, and also within several different lines (the national one, which began with the Exodus from Egypt; the universal one, which began with the creation of the world; and the personal one, which began with one’s birth).

Time as a Spiral

Why, in fact, did God create in His world a dual system of two kinds of time-axis? What is the purpose of this structure?

The myth of Sisyphus describes an eternal process of ascent followed by descent back again. Circular time is Sisyphean, and therefore devoid of meaning. Albert Camus, in his book The Myth of Sisyphus, tries to propose an alternative of linear time (and on that basis reaches even the point of legitimizing suicide). In His Torah, God offers us a different logic: a combination of these two axes, which creates a spiral that advances while turning in circles.

A parable for this is climbing a mountain. If one climbs directly up the mountain (= straight on), this may be very difficult, and it is likely that one will not succeed. If one circles around it, this is indeed easier, but one simply does not advance upward. The only realistic way to climb is to combine these two routes: to climb upward while circling (this is also how a road that climbs a mountain is generally planned).

The moral is our lives. The landmarks on the axis of time are tick marks on both axes. Such a perspective allows us to see that there is a way to climb upward. We are always in a process of climbing, and there is always somewhere further for us to advance. The cyclical-circular tracks are intended to help us climb. We celebrate a birthday in order to see that we have completed another cycle, but we must always examine whether, along the vertical axis, we are higher than we were on the previous birthday. Does our Passover or our Rosh Hashanah look like last year’s, or did we meet the challenge and manage to climb higher? The purpose of repetition is to give each of us an opportunity for improvement and further ascent. It is important to ensure that we are making use of this, and not continuing to move in Sisyphean circles that strip our lives of meaning, as individuals and as a group. This is the reason that the axis of time was built in such a spiral form.

And Where Is God in All This?

There is an additional condition for such progress to be possible: that there be a mountain to climb. That there be a goal for the climb, and an axis that defines what is ‘up’ and what is ‘down.’ Such a definition requires something, or someone, greater than anything we know. Someone who fills all reality, from bottom to top. Improvement can occur only in the direction of the Infinite, that is, toward God. Service of God defines for us a direction of ascent and establishes its very possibility. Therefore this is also the measuring rod by which we must examine whether we are on a Sisyphean track or not.

At a time when one marks a year in the history of the community, while looking both backward and forward, this is the opportunity to ensure that it is indeed on on the road ascending to Bethel ("the road ascending to the house of God").

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1. C. ESCHER claims that there are also ascents that are Sisyphean!?

[1] It seems to me that there is no one who has not wondered at least once what happens at the edge of the universe. What is there beyond the edge? Is it possible to sit on the edge and dangle one’s legs outward?

[2] Interestingly, these positive commandments are not defined as time-bound positive commandments, and yet women are exempt from them.

[3] According to our proposal, even if there were a one-time commandment in our lives, bounded on the time-axis from both sides, women would be obligated in it. It is interesting that there is no such commandment in the Torah. Bounded commandments are always found specifically on the circular axis.