The "interwebs" are rife with half-baked feel-goodisms attributed to Albert Einstein that he never would have thought, much less uttered - but one subtly profound insight he really did make is:
"Machen sie Grundelemente so einfach wie möglich zu machen, aber nicht einfacher"
Which is usually rendered:
הכל צריך להיות פשוט ככל האפשר, אבל לא פשוט יותר
Make everything as simple as possible, but no simpler.
Einstein here hardly means to dumb things down, to hack our subject down to something easily digestable; he's telling us to grapple with the full complexity of the subject and build our understanding using as few and as simple elements as possible: פשוט ככל האפשר - what data scientist Grahame Keith calls virtuous simplification: providing a unifying framework that collapses complexity and reconciles apparent ambiguity. Virtuous simplification contains complexity allowing basic comprehension by the uninitiated, while letting the full complexity of the subject to unfold from those simple precepts, the פשוט.
Einstein's audience for this comment was his theoretical physicist peers, who were - and are - engaged in peeling away and peeling away to reveal, as Nobel laureate Paul Davies puts it: the mind of God.
That is something like that enterprise at the table in the NorthWest corner of the Ohr Kodesh Social Hall - where, for some decades now, Ohr Kodesh "Jews for Exegesis" have been peeling away at the parasha hashavuah.
For 15 years or so our our guide in this enterprise was the celebrated exegete RASHI - Since we completed Rashi's known commentary on Torah, about 9 years ago, our guide has been RAbbi SHmuel Ben Meir - aka RASHBAM, Rashi's grandson. Today we celebrate completing the known Torah commentary of RASHBAM - who would definitely appreciate Albert Einstein's caution to Make everything as simple as possible, but no simpler. פשוט ככל האפשר, אבל לא פשוט יותר
Rav Shmuel ben Meir lived in late 11th into the 12th Century a time when the classic rabbinic exegetic method widely known as PARDES - a Persian borrow word for Orchard and a Hebrew acronym for P'shat: Direct: Remez: Hints; D'Rash: Inquiry; Sod: Mystical - was skewing toward P'shat - and RASHBAM is one of the greatest exemplars of the this method. Rashi, Rashbam's grandfather understood the concept of peshat and made use of it in his commentary, but he would also dive deep into the linguistics of scriptural words and he made judicious use of midrash - possibly a key to his enduring popularity, However, Rashi used the term פשוטו של מקרא to refer to the “true” meaning of Scripture on its own terms.
Rashbam, in a historical defense of the peshat method, claimed that his grandfather Rashi confessed that if he had to write his commentaries all over again, he would do so using Rashbam’s strict peshat method (Rashbam, Gen. 37:2 beginning of the story of Joseph - Rashi invokes a midrash establishing the primacy of Joseph among b'nei Yaakov, and the similarities between Joseph and Yaakov - all from ":
RASHBAM on Genesis 37:2
אלה תולדות יעקב, intelligent people must remember that our sages taught us that in spite of all different methods of exegesis of the text of the written Torah, no verse may legitimately be explained in a manner which contradicts the plain meaning of the text. While it is true that the Torah, by means of allusions, grammatical anomalies, trope/cantilation, etc., teaches us far more than meets the eye when we look at the raw text, there are strict limitations even to these methods ... commentators of olden times, thanks to their piety, relied exclusively on the drashot i.e. allegorical and ethical interpretations of anomalies in the text of the Torah, thereby neglecting a thorough study of the text as it presents itself to the average, not scholarly, reader. .,..students [who] have not become used to ...immediately looking at and relying on commentary. for we read in Masachet Shabbat 63; in the name of Rav Kahane “I was already eighteen years old and had studied the entire Talmud, but had not ever been taught of the principle that '...the written Torah must not be interpreted in a manner which completely nullifies its plain meaning.” Also Rabbi Shlomoh, my mother’s father of blessed memory (Rashi) the brilliant exegete, who wrote commentaries on the entire Bible, was careful not to ignore the plain meaning of the text. I, Shmuel, Rashi’s grandson, have argued with him, and he admitted to me that if he had the opportunity, he would compose an additional commentary in which he would concentrate on the plain meaning as it became clearer to him with each passing day. ...
Based on such comments, we see RASHBAM felt strongly there is no Remez, D'rash or Sod without P'shat - they are contained in the p'shat and careful study of the plain meaning reveals its full complexity.
Today's Parasha- Tetzaveh is a fertile ground to test this idea - Skirts and trousers, a jewel encrusted apron that can provide divine instruction - what could more inscrutable in its plain meaning than the vestments of the Cohen Gadol. What does Rashbam, champion of pshat have to show us about the ephod, the choshen, the urim and thummim
(ב) וְעָשִׂ֥יתָ בִגְדֵי־קֹ֖דֶשׁ לְאַהֲרֹ֣ן אָחִ֑יךָ לְכָב֖וֹד וּלְתִפְאָֽרֶת׃
(2) Make sacral vestments for your brother Aaron, for dignity and adornment.
(א) ועשו את האפוד - אפוד וחשן זקני פירשם. אך אני אפרש בהם דברים שלא נתפרשו.
(1) ועשו את האפוד; although my grandfather (Rashi) has explained both the ephod and the choshen in detail, I plan to concentrate on some aspects which he has not mentioned in his commentary.
חשן משפט - לפי שנותנים בהם האורים והתומים שמגידים משפט ישראל וצרכיהם, כדכתיב: ושאל לו במשפט האורים לכן קרוי [חשן] משפט.
חשן משפט, the name reflects the fact that in the pocket of the breastplate there was placed the parchment with the Holy name of G’d, known popularly as urim vetumim, the tool by means of which G’d could be consulted if the High Priest did not know the answer to a question involving Jewish religious law. He would then consult G’d and receive his answer by the letters on the breastplate becoming illuminated. (compare Numbers 27,21).
את האורים ואת התומים - כעין השבעות של שמות בדבר הקב"ה שהיה נותן בהחשן להגיד משפטן וצרכיהם. אם האומות מגידים להם תרפים וקסמים שלהם ברוח טומאה, להבדיל כמה הבדלות בין טומאה לטהרה, ק"ו לקדושה שמגדת.
את האורים ואת התומים; the function was somewhat similar to that of oracles employed by the priests of idolatrous cults. If those had any value at all, -and we may assume that at least their worshippers had concluded that they did, -how much more influential would these urim vetumim in the sacred garments of the High Priest be in order to elicit answers to questions posed to G’d, seeing that the means employed were holy and sanctioned by G’d Himself?
He seems to accept plainly, the efficacy of divination by means of the urim and thummim - worthwhile to take a brief detour to Deuteronomy chapter 13 "you are not to hearken to the words of that prophet or to that dreamer of dreams ... HaShem is testing you..."
(א) כי מנסה ה׳ וגו' - נתן כח בכשפים לדעת הנולדות לנסות ולזכות ישראל, שהתרה בהם: לא יהיה בך מעונן ומנחש ומכשף וגו' עד תמים תהיה עם ה׳ אלקיך - ואם לא יאמינו בעבודת גילולים, זו היא זכותן.
(1) 'כי מנסה ה׳ וגו, the only reason G’d allowed such people to possess what sounds like supernatural knowledge, is to test our faith, to see if we will heed the prohibition against using such sources of information and of tolerating such people as part of our culture. By choosing not to resort to the knowledge of such people of the future, etc., we accumulate merits in G’d’s books (compare Deut. 18,10-13). Refusing to believe such false prophets is in itself a good deed. Believing them is equivalent to believing in idolatry.
<https://www.thetorah.com/article/can-a-false-prophet-perform-miracles>
Prof. Rabbi Marty Lockshin: - who, thanks to our facilitator Richard Friedman was a frequent adjunct to Rashbam these nine years - makes an interesting comparison of Ibn Ezra and Rashbam acceptance of such seeming supernatural appurtances:
Lockshin points out Ibn Ezra - who was roughly a contemporary of Rashbam's - both lived in Northern France in the early 1100's - it's tempting to imagine they argued face to face - although there is no record or even hint they ever did - Lockshin points out Ibn Ezra eschews any hint of supernatural action, the "false prophet" can only produce symbolic actions.
On Rashbams comments here on the Urim and Thummim, Lockshin says: "In Rashbam’s understanding, the world is filled with effective ways to predict the future. ... Sorcery is forbidden not because it does not work, but despite the fact that it does.
"Rashbam’s interpretation reflects his belief that our world contains forces of good and forces of evil, and that supernatural powers can be found in both. "
Lockshin continues: "I believe it is possible Rashbam is polemicizing here, only not against Christianity, but against ibn Ezra
Rashbam, ... generally does not place limits on his search for peshat, ... he believed in magic, as we saw above, and was not interested in Greek/Arabic style philosophy, ...
Nowadays, we ...may be inclined to prefer ibn Ezra’s understanding of the world. Nevertheless, to try to interpret the Torah to fit with 21stcentury conceptions of reality would be forcing the text to say something it does not. ... Rashbam’s more natural approach to the text comes closest to the modern academic way of reading it, even if some of his premises about how the world works are starkly different than ours"
וחגרת אותם אבנט אהרן ובניו - בזה נחלקו במסכת יומא, לפי שאין סדר לבישתן הכתוב כאן כסדר לבישתן בפ' צו את אהרן ולפי הפשט אין לדקדק.
וחגרת אותם אבנט אהרן ובניו; concerning the sequence in which these garments were to be put on there is a disagreement in Yuma 5 seeing that the order mentioned here does not correspond to the order written in Leviticus 8,7-9. I believe, that the very fact that we find two versions as to the sequence is meant to tell us that the sequence in which these garment were put on did not matter.
These comments manifest Rashbam’s core approach: that Torah must be understood in its context; the foundation of understanding begins with direct reading and oftimes the most profound wisdom lies in seeing the Torah for what it plainly says.
So - thank you, fellow congregants for indulging our occupation of the social hall's northwest corner. You are always welcome to join us - no experience necessary, as we move on from Rashbam to Italian commentator Sforno, another advocate of the pshat.
And not to forget - today we not only celebrate Jews for Exegesis, but it is Shabbat Zakhor, where we are reminded to "לְרִשְׁתָּ֔הּ תִּמְחֶה֙ אֶת־זֵ֣כֶר עֲמָלֵ֔ק מִתַּ֖חַת הַשָּׁמָ֑יִם לֹ֖א תִּשְׁכָּֽח׃" "blot out the memory of Amalek from under the heavens; you are not to forget!" - another seemingly inscrutable instruction ... Rashbam here has no comment ... פשותו... it's self-evident - Erase all trace of those who afflict the beaten down ones, those who oppress the weary and vulnerable - those who - despite all efforts are still with us - not yet blotted out - That's the simple meaning - as simple as possible - but alas - no simpler.