Avos 4:11

בס׳ד

אבות ד:יא

Rabbi Eliezer ben Yaakov says: Anyone who performs a single mitzvah creates for himself a single Defender; And anyone who commits a single transgression creates for himself a single Accuser. Repentance and good deeds are a shield against retribution. Rabbi Yohanan the Sandal Maker says: Every gathering in the Name of Heaven is destined to endure; But those not in the Name of Heaven are not destined to endure.

רַבִּי אֱלִיעֶזֶר בֶּן יַעֲקֹב אוֹמֵר, הָעוֹשֶׂה מִצְוָה אַחַת, קוֹנֶה לוֹ פְרַקְלִיט אֶחָד. וְהָעוֹבֵר עֲבֵרָה אַחַת, קוֹנֶה לוֹ קַטֵּגוֹר אֶחָד. תְּשׁוּבָה וּמַעֲשִׂים טוֹבִים, כִּתְרִיס בִּפְנֵי הַפֻּרְעָנוּת. רַבִּי יוֹחָנָן הַסַּנְדְּלָר אוֹמֵר, כָּל כְּנֵסִיָּה שֶׁהִיא לְשֵׁם שָׁמַיִם, סוֹפָהּ לְהִתְקַיֵּם. וְשֶׁאֵינָהּ לְשֵׁם שָׁמַיִם, אֵין סוֹפָהּ לְהִתְקַיֵּם:

        Both Rabbi Eliezer ben Yaakov and his colleague, Rabbi Yohanan the Sandal Maker, were students of Rabbi Aqiva in the last years of the Vineyard at Yavneh.

        Like many students of Rabbi Aqiva, the complex problem of human freedom formed a major topic for Rabbi Eliezer ben Yaakov. His teaching here reminds us that the patterns of living we establish for ourselves direct us toward certain experiences and sensitize us to certain realities.  Our choices are free but, paradoxically, the effects of our choices can control us for good or ill.  The kind of person we become depends upon the choices we make regarding comprehensive paths of life.

        This is especially so regarding mitzvahs.  Although we never know the ultimate purpose of a mitzvah, we do know that it is our obligation to perform it. A life of consistent engagement with mitzvahs, however, has an impact over and above our obligation to perform them.  The discipline of performance sharpens our sensibilities to the Divine Order that penetrates our own world. Performing mitzvahs with genuine devotion is part of a process by which we transform ourselves through our own efforts into people genuinely capable of responding to holiness.

        This, I think, is what Rabbi Eliezer has in mind by “Defenders” and “Accusers.”  All of our actions - good ones and bad ones - create in us dispositions to continue in one or the other direction.  Each act, that is, is not only the result of previous actions, but a force that generates further actions.  The dispositions generated  by a mitzvah generate a tendency to perform others, while those generated by a willful transgression create a tendency in the opposite direction. Jewish living is a kind of interior struggle with these opposing forces as we seek to create in ourselves the overall drive to continue in the path of mitzvahs.  In this struggle, we work out our freedom.

        The Tiferes Yisroel has a beautiful drashah that illustrates this point in reference to the dream of Yaakov Avinu about the angels ascending and descending a ladder whose foot was on Earth but whose top reached the Heavens: “As Yaakov Avinu left the home of his righteous ancestors for the home of the Wicked Lavan, he saw a ladder planted in the Earth.  This stands for the body.  And the top reaching to the Heavens stands for the soul.  And the angels of God ascending and descending are a person’s psychological powers. We have it in our power to devote them to Heaven and elevate them, or to bring them low…For this reason we must be careful in the ‘house of Lavan’, for these angels can become either Defenders or Accusers, and from them proceed good things or bad things.”  We ourselves create our Defenders and Accusers by the choices we make.

        Are we entirely at the mercy of the effects of our actions?  Rabbi Eliezer thinks not.  This is the point of his observation that teshuvah and good deeds can “shield” us from the effects of our past actions.  As we say on Yom Kippur: uteshuvah, utefillah, utzedakah maavirin es roas hagezerah (and repentance, and prayer, and and charity avert the harshness of the decree). Teshuvah is the ultimate assertion of our freedom from the inertia of our past actions. We can freely choose it at any moment and reorient our lives.  Without it, we continue in the course our previous actions have determined. It’s important to pay attention, finally, to Rabbi Eliezer’s choice of words. He doesn’t say that teshuvah totally prevents retribution. Rather, it is a shield, protecting us from the devastation that our acts might otherwise deserve, from the “harshness of the decree”.  We do live with the consequences of ALL our actions, but a reorientation towards HaShem in teshuvah gives us the strength to live through the tough after-effects of our previous decisions.

        Rabbi Yohanan the Sandal Maker’s teaching appears at first to be obvious. We might think: OF COURSE, gatherings devoted to honoring the Name of Heaven will succeed while those gathered in opposition to HaShem will fail! Why does this even need to be mentioned?  It needs to be mentioned for a very simple reason.  Not every gathering that claims to be devoted to the service of HaShem is REALLY motivated by that purpose.

        As the Tosfos Yom Tov points out, gatherings of organizations claiming to further and enhance the life of Torah can often be occasions for giving empty honors and status to those who form and run them.  So the real point of Rabbi Yohanan’s teaching is to force us to reflect upon the relation of our community’s EXPRESSED motives to those that REALLY motivate it.  This issue can be a very painful one, and it is often very hard to go “against the stream” of an organization or community and point out the way it’s profession of kashrus can mask self-serving ends.  Later on, in Avos 5:17, we’ll study a concrete example of this problem in the distinction between the motives of the disciples of Hillel and Shammai versus those of Korakh and his gang.

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