Q&A: The Wisdom of the Sages
The Wisdom of the Sages
Question
Hello Rabbi, we haven’t spoken in a long time and I missed it—everything okay?
I have a question: who exactly was Moses? Maybe he was just a scribe and not especially wise—what do we actually have left from him? Okay, fine, he wrote the Torah, but beyond that do we have any writings or proofs of his wisdom?! With King Solomon, Rabbi Akiva, Rabbi Yosi, Rabbi Tarfon, Abaye, and Rava, we all have proof of their wisdom—they’re mentioned in the Talmud, in the Mishnah, etc. But Moses—what do we have from him? Really, I could also have written the Torah if the Holy One, blessed be He, had dictated it to me!
Answer
I don’t think we have evidence of the wisdom of Rabbi Akiva or Rabbi Yosi either. What is so especially wise about what they left us? The question is not how wise all these figures were. Even if they were not, their words would still be binding. In Moses’ case, that is because he was a prophet; and in the case of the sages of the Talmud, it is because we accepted their authority upon ourselves. I elaborated on this in my trilogy.