Bava Basra 84a ~ “Why are Sunsets Red?” asked the Rabbi and the Scientist

Sunset from Clearwater Florida, Jan 29, 2020. Photo from the Talmudology archive.

We are studying the tractate Bava Basrsa (The Last Gate), which is currently dealing with the circumstances under which the sale of goods may be voided.  The Mishnah (83b) ruled that if there is agreement to sell red wheat (שחמתית) and it was found to be white (לבנה), both the seller and the buyer have legal grounds to retract. The Talmud then discusses the names for these colors: what we call red and white are called "like the sun" and "like the moon." Rav Pappa (the Babylonian sage who died in 375CE) took this a step further:

בבא בתרא פד,א

בצפרא דחלפא אבי וורדי דגן עדן בפניא דחלפא אפתחא דגיהנם – ואיכא דאמרי איפכא

In the morning it becomes red as it passes over the site of the roses of the Garden of Eden, [whose reflections give the light a red hue]. In the evening the sun turns red because it passes over the entrance of Gehenna, whose fires redden the light. And there are those who say the opposite [in explaining why the sun is red in the morning and the evening, i.e., in the morning it passes over the entrance of Gehenna, while in the evening it passes over the site of the roses of the Garden of Eden.]

Shmuel ben Meir, known as Rashbam (d. ~1158) explained that "our eyes are not able to discern the colors very well because in the middle of the day the light is blinding. But in the morning and the evening, when the sun is less bright, we can see the redness of the sun."

 מאור עינינו אינו ברור כל כך מתוך אור היום שמכהה עינינו אבל צפרא ופניא שהיום חשוך ניכר אדמומית החמה ורב פפא לפרש משנתנו בא אמאי מקרי שחמתית

According to Rav Pappa, the true color of the sun is red - but this true color can be seen only when the sun is at its least intense - in the evening and the morning. We have all experienced Rav Pappa's description: who cannot be moved by the sight of a blazing red sunrise or sunset? But what is the scientific explanation of these colors?

“דְּאָמַר רַבִּי חִיָּיא בַּר אַבָּא אָמַר רַבִּי יוֹחָנָן: מִצְוָה לְהִתְפַּלֵּל עִם דִּמְדּוּמֵי חַמָּה. וְאָמַר רַבִּי זֵירָא: מַאי קְרָאָה — ״יִירָאוּךָ עִם שָׁמֶשׁ וְלִפְנֵי יָרֵחַ דּוֹר דּוֹרִים״

Rabbi Chiyya bar Abba said that Rabbi Yochanan said: It is a mitzva to pray with the reddening of the sun. And Rabbi Zeira said: What is the verse that alludes to this? “Let them fear You with the sun and before the moon, generation after generation” (Psalms 72:5)…”

— Berachot 29b

The sequence above shows the setting Sun dipping toward the western horizon. As the Sun sinks lower, its color becomes more reddened. From here.

Why sunrise & sunset are red - the science

Here is the scientific explanation. At sunrise and sunset the light from the sun is not directly overhead, but from its position on the horizon it must pass through more of the atmosphere to reach our eyes, as you can see here.

From here.

You may recall that ever since Newton and his prism we have known that white light is made up of many different wavelengths, or colors of light (Figure 1 below). As the sun’s white light passes through our atmosphere, the shorter wavelengths of light are scattered (Figure 2). And the longer the path through our atmosphere, the more the shorter wavelengths of light are scattered away from the original white sun beam. All of that scattered light (Figure 3) is from the shorter, blue end of the spectrum, which is what colors the sky blue (whatever else your dad may have told you). The remaining unscattered light is at the red end of the spectrum, and that’s why the sun appears red at sunrise and sunset, and why the clouds that reflect it are colored red.

From here.

The Color of the Sun in Space, and on Earth

According to NASA experts (who really are rocket scientists, among other things), the sun emits all colors of the visible light spectrum. And when you mix all these colors together you get...white. If you were to look at the sun from high in space, (perhaps aboard the International Space Station), it would indeed appear to be a pure white.  Like this:

It was in the seventeenth century that Isaac Newton used a prism to split the sun's light into its constituent colors. Before then it was raindrops that did the same thing, forming a rainbow as a result.

Isaac Newton divided  a ray of sunlight with a prism in a series of experiments published in 1672.  Lego recreation is from here.

“Here on Earth, the atmosphere plays a role in the color of the sun. Since shorter wavelength blue light is scattered more efficiently than longer wavelength red light, we lose some of the blue tint of the sun as sunlight passes through the atmosphere. In addition, all wavelengths of visible light passing through our atmosphere are attenuated so that the light that reaches our eyes does not immediately saturate the cone receptors. This allows the brain to perceive color from the image with a little less blue – yellow. ”

— NASA

The Cultural determinants of the Sun's Color

On their website, the NASA scientists claim that "sometimes the display color of the Sun is culturally determined. If a kindergartener in the USA colors a picture of the Sun, they will usually make it yellow. However, a kindergartener in Japan would normally color it red!"  The rabbis of the Talmud had their own cultural explanation of the colors of the sun.  As we have seen, after suggesting that the color of the sun may actually be white (because that is the color of a patch of skin with zora'at, usually identified as a kind of leprosy), the Talmud then explains the cause of the red sunrises and sunsets:  

ולמאי דסליק דעתין מעיקרא הא קא סמקא צפרא ופניא בצפרא דחלפא אבי וורדי דגן עדן בפניא דחלפא אפתחא דגיהנם

In the morning it becomes red as it passes over the site of the roses of the Garden of Eden, whose reflections give the light a red hue. In the evening the sun turns red because it passes over the entrance of Gehenna, whose fires redden the light...

Without the scientific understanding we have today, the Talmud claimed that the red color of sunrise and sunset was due to the light filtering though the red roses of the Garden of Eden, and fires of Hell.

is the Garden of Eden real or metaphorical?

It would seem that the Talmud's description of the locations of the Garden of Eden and the Gates of Hell is to be taken literally, for it is given as an explanation for physical phenomena.  But here is where things can get tricky. The famous rabbi Joseph Hayyim of Baghdad (1834–1909) wrote a work that is widely read by Sephardic Jews to this day called Ben Ish Hai. He also  published three volumes of responsa between 1901 and 1905 called Rav Pe’alim. (A fourth volume was posthumously published in 1912.) In an undated question, R. Hayyim was asked about the location of the Garden of Eden. In one tradition, the garden was located “on the other side of the world,” somewhere below the equator in the southern hemisphere. However, the questioner continued, the world has been circumnavigated, and the Garden of Eden has not been identified. Where then is it located?

In his answer, R. Hayyim digressed into the truth claims of science, and then returned to the location of the Garden of Eden. He noted that although it may be located on the Earth itself, it existed on a different spiritual plane and would therefore not be perceived by the human senses. I suppose many moderns would agree with the suggestion that the Garden of Eden is not to be found in a geographic location. But today's page of Talmud reminds us that at least in talmudic Babylon, the Garden of Eden was not just a metaphor.  It determined the very colors of the sun.

The Poet and the Scientist

Science is not the only way of understanding the world. Artists, poets, philosophers and religions all add different kinds of knowledge about the very same physical world that science explains. Science explains that a red sunrise is a result of physics. Rabbi Chiyya explained that it is because the sun reflects the red roses of the Garden of Eden. Which explanation most satisfies your mind? And which most satisfies your heart?

“In philosophy [i.e.science] one must proceed from wonder to no wonder, that is, one should continue one’s investigation until that which we thought strange no longer seems strange to us; but in theology, one must proceed from no wonder to wonder, that is…[until] that which does not seem strange to us does seem strange, and that all is wonderful.”

— Isaac Beekman. Journal tenu par Isaac Beekman de 1604 a 1634. Ed C de Waard. The Hague: M Nijhoff, 1939-53. vol 2, p375.

Talmudology on the Parsha, Ki Tetze ~ The Mamzer

This week’s parsha is full of interesting material, for it contains no fewer than 74 mitzvot. That is more than any other parashah, and a whopping 12% of all of the 613 mitzvot in the Torah (though Maimonides counted only 72. Whatever). We had to narrow down our discussion to just one of these, and so, at random, we chose the commandment about the mamzer.

Who is a MaMzer?

A mamzer is a child born of a certain union that is forbidden in the Torah. Examples would be a child born from an adulterous relationship (where the woman is married to another person) or an incestuous one. A mamzer is not a child born out of wedlock, and who was once known as a bastard. In this week’s parsha The Torah prohibits a mamzer from entering into marriage with an ordinary Jew:

דברים כג, ג

לֹא־יָבֹ֥א מַמְזֵ֖ר בִּקְהַ֣ל יְהֹוָ֑ה גַּ֚ם דּ֣וֹר עֲשִׂירִ֔י לֹא־יָ֥בֹא ל֖וֹ בִּקְהַ֥ל יְהֹוָֽה׃

The mamzer shall be admitted into the congregation of God; no descendant of such, even in the tenth generation, shall be admitted into the congregation of God

According to Rabbi Abahu in the Talmud Yerushalmi (Kiddushin 3:12) the word mamzer comes from the Hebrew מום זר - mum zar - “a strange defect.” It is on the basis of this etymology that many have tried to find defects in the anatomy or the personality of a mamzer. This week on Talmudology on the Parsha we will examine rabbinic attitudes towards the mamzer.

The Mamzer is infertile, and more likely to die early

According to the famous medieval scholar Rabbi Jacob ben Asher (c. 1269 - c. 1343), who was also known as the Ba’al Haturim, a mamzer is infertile:

בעל הטורים דברים כג, ג

לא יבא ממזר בקהל ה' סמך ממזר לפצוע דכה שממזר אינו מוליד כפצוע דכא

The verse about the mamzer is written close to the verse about the person with crushed genitalia to teach that just like that person, a mamzer cannot reproduce.

In a variation on this theme, the medieval Sefer Hasidim wrote that a mamzer can indeed reproduce, but his or her children will be infertile:

מכאן יש לומר למוליד ממזר לא מבעיא דלא קיים מצות פריה ורביה אלא שמעכב את המשיח דקאמר ממזר לא חי אותו ממזר שמוליד לא יוליד בנים דלא חיי כטרפה

Both of these assertions are at odds with the Torah itself, in which the verse stated that no descendants of the mamzer were to be admitted into the congregation, which surely implies that a mamzer can indeed reproduce. And while I know of no clinical study looking at the fertility of the children of prohibited unions, there is, prima facie, no reason whatsoever to believe that children born, say, of an adulterous relationship, are infertile.

Of course, this is not true of children born of incestuous unions. In these cases, there is indeed a higher likelihood of all manner of genetic problems, of which infertility may be one expression. A paper published in 1979 titled A Study of Chidren of Incestuous Matings noted that in a group of 161 children from incestuous matings, prenatal, neonatal and infant mortality was higher than among half-siblings who were offspring of unrelated parents, and this group also had a higher rate of congenital malformations. Thus, the observation of Rav Huna in the Talmud Yerushalmi (קידושין ד, א) that “a mamzer does not live for more than thirty days” (אֵין מַמְזֵר חַיי יוֹתֵר מִשְּׁלֹשִׁים יוֹם) might actually have some factual basis, at least for a subset of mamzerim.

Congenital malformations and other abnormalities. From E. Seemanova. A study of children of incestuous matings. Human Heredity 1971: 21: 108-128.

On the Characteristics of a Mamzer

Some rabbis believed that the mamzer was endowed with certain talents, while others wrote that he (or she) was physically different to other people. According Abba Shaul in the Talmud Yerushalmi (Kiddushin 4:11), “most mamzerim are intelligent - רוֹב מַמְזֵירִין פִּקְחִין. (Abba Shaul may also have been behind the famous aphorism that “the best physicians should go to hell”, and we have dealt with that elsewhere.) Still, Abba Shaul’s sweeping statement was not seen as a compliment. Here is the standard commentary on the Yerushalmi, called Korban Ha’edah. It was written by the German rabbi David ben Naphtali Frankel (~1704-1762):

רוב ממזרים פקחי. שדומין לאביהן שהם בעלי ערמה לפתות הנשים ולהסתיר מעשיהם מבני האדם ונ"מ להזהר מהם

Most mamzerim are intelligent: Because they are like their fathers, who are crafty in their ability to seduce women and hide their actions from others. It is important to be aware of this characteristic, so that we can beware of them.

The other standard commentary on the Yerushalmi, Moshe Margolies’ Pnei Moshe, makes exactly the same point:

רוב ממזרים פקחין. שהן דומין לאביהן בעלי ערמה ומתנכלים בתחבולות לפתות הנשים ולהסתיר מעשיהם מבני אדם

So a better translation of the original Yerushalmi, according to these two commentaries, would be: “Most mamzerim are crafty, and therefore they should not be trusted.” It was this belief that led the authors of the early medieval Hebrew work Toldot Yeshu - “A History of Jesus,” to claim that Jesus was himself a mamzer, because he had acted in a brazen manner in front of the Sanhedrin.

A similar observation is made in the minor tractate Kallah:

עז פנים רבי אליעזר אומר ממזר רבי יהושע אומר בן הנדה רבי עקיבא אומר ממזר ובן הנדה

The bold-faced, Rabbi Eliezer said, is the mamzer; the son of a niddah, said Rabbi Joshua; Rabbi Akivah said: Both a mamzer and the son of a niddah.

Given the long tradition of ascribing personality characteristics to the mamzer, it is not surprising that some went one step further and claimed that the mamzer has certain specific physical characteristics. Rabbi Elijah ben Solomon Abraham Hacohen, of Smyrna (~1650-1729) was a mystic who produced over thirty books. Like many of his time, Rabbi Elijah was a strong believer in palm reading, the belief that lines on the palm reflect the personality and future fate of a person. He also believed in a version of phrenology, in which bumps on the skull indicate a person’s intelligence and other qualities. In his work Midrash Talpiot, which was a collection of rabbinic sayings mixed with his own observations, Rabbi Elijah wrote that “the shape of the ear will reflect if there is any degree of mamzerut” - “באזן ניכר מי שיש בו צד ממזרות.” Alas, the rabbi did not give any more details, fearing that they might be misused.

Elijah Hacohen. Midrash Talpiot, Lemberg 1875, 30.

The mamzer cannot enter Jerusalem

Avot de’Rabbi Natan is companion text to the Mishnaic Pirkei Avot, and is usually printed along with the minor tractates of the Talmud. It was composed sometime in the era of the Gaonim, between 650-900 CE. In its eighth chapter we read the following:

אבות דרנבי נתן יב, ח

וכן מי שעובר עבירה והוליד ממזר אומרים לו ריקה חבלת בעצמך חבלת בו [שאותו ממזר היה רוצה ללמוד תורה עם אותן התלמידים] שהיו יושבין ושונין בירושלים והיה הממזר הולך עמהן עד שהגיע לאשדוד עומד שם ואומר אוי לי אילו לא הייתי ממזר כבר הייתי יושב ושונה בין התלמידים שלמדתי עד עכשיו ולפי שאני ממזר איני יושב ושונה בין התלמידים לפי שאין ממזר נכנס לירושלים כל עיקר שנאמר (זכריה ט) וישב ממזר באשדוד (והכרתי גאון פלשתים

So, too, with someone whose sexual transgression produces a mamzer. They say to him: Empty one! You have ruined yourself and you have ruined him as well! [For this mamzer would have wanted to study Torah with the rest of the students] who sit and study in Jerusalem. But this mamzer would go with them only up to Ashdod, and then would stop there and say: Woe is me! If I were not a mamzer, I would have gone to sit and study among the students whom I have been studying with until now. But because I am a mamzer, I cannot sit and study among these students. For a mamzer cannot enter Jerusalem at all, as it says (Zechariah 9:6), “The mamzer will stay in Ashdod, (and I will cut off the pride of the Philistines.”

Mi Sheberach for a Mamzer

In one of his volumes of responsa, Rabbi Chezkiah Fivel Plaut (1818-1894) was asked whether it was permissible to call a mamzer up to the Torah. Rabbi Plaut, who was a student of the Chatam Sofer, concluded that it is indeed permitted, but did not know if it was permitted to say the general prayer for the well-being of the person called to the Torah, known as the Mi Sheberach (מי שברך). “I am uncertain whether to say the Mi Shebarch, because the focus of this blessing is on his children, and God forbid that there would be more mamzerim among the Jewish people.”

Chezkiah Feival Plaut. Likutei Chaver ben Chaim. Munkach 1883. 104b.

Tattooing the Forehead of a mamzer with a warning

Rabbi Yishmael Hacohen (1723-1811), came from a distinguished rabbinic family and took over the mantle of leadership in the Italian city of Modena from his older brother who died in 1781. In 1881 he was asked by Rabbi Avraham Yona of Venice whether it was permitted to tattoo the forehead of a mamzer with the word “mamzer,” which would serve as a warning sign not to allow this person to marry into the Jewish community. The halakhic concerns revolve around the question of tattooing, and not, as we might think today, as to whether this was a reasonable thing to do.

Rabbi Yona was an enthusiastic supporter of the idea, but Rabbi Yishmael was, at least initially, not sure. But at the end of his lengthy responsa he concluded that it was indeed permitted, since although tattooing was forbidden, if it was performed by a Gentile it was allowed in this case, for it prevented “a greater transgression.” This opinion is cited in דרכי תשובה יורה דעה קפ, סק’א.

It is permitted to tattoo the forehead of a mamzer. From Yishmael ben Avraham Hacohen. Zera Emet. Vol 3, 140b.

Modern Efforts to Ignore Mamzerut

There are certain caterogical rulings in the Torah that the rabbis did their best to ignore. The Torah demand “an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth” (Exodus 21:23–27), but the rabbis ignored this and interpreted the verse as requiring monetary compensation (Bava Kamma 83b–84a). The Torah demanded that loans be forgiven every seven years during the shmitta year (Deuteronomy 15:1–6), but the rabbis found this law to be unworkable. So Hillel Hazaken created the prozbul which protected the investment of the lenders. Despite the severity of the prohibition of mamzer, and not withstanding some of the later rabbinic statements that we have seen, talmudic and contemporary rabbis were often very sympathetic to the plight of the mamzer, and went to extreme legal lengths to remove the label. So for example in tractate Yevamot (80b) Rava ruled that a child born twelve months after a married woman’s husband left her and travelled abroad was not a mamzer. Perhaps, he argued, the pregnancy had just been unusually long.

יבמות פ, ב

אֶלָּא הָא דַּעֲבַד רָבָא תּוֹסְפָאָה עוֹבָדָא בְּאִשָּׁה שֶׁהָלַךְ בַּעְלָהּ לִמְדִינַת הַיָּם וְאִישְׁתַּהִי עַד תְּרֵיסַר יַרְחֵי שַׁתָּא וְאַכְשְׁרֵיהּ כְּמַאן כְּרַבִּי דְּאָמַר מִשְׁתַּהֵא

With regard to the action taken by Rava Tosfa’a concerning a woman whose husband went overseas and her baby was delayed in her womb for the twelve months of the year following her husband’s departure, and Rava Tosfa’a rendered the child fit, arguing that the husband is presumed to be the father and the child is not a mamzer…

Perhaps the best example recent example of this effort comes from the late Rabbi Ovadia Yosef (1920-2013) who was the Sephardi Chief Rabbi of Israel from 1973-1983. He was asked about the case of a young woman who believed that she was a mamzeret. Her mother had been married by a haredi rabbi to a man who subsequently left her, converted to Christianity, married another woman, and refused to give his first a Jewish divorce. This wife later obtained a civil (but not a Jewish) divorce, remarried civilly and had the daughter. This daughter was indisputably the result the union of a woman who is married (under Jewish law) and a man who was not her husband, that making her children mamzerim.

But Rabbi Yosef found a way to demonstrate that the daughter was not technically a mamzeret, although he never explicitly stated any discomfort with the notion of mamzer. In his work Yabiah Omer (volume 7, Even Ha’ezer 6) he refused to allow any testimony from the mother, since she was an interested party. He also refused to allow any testimony from the haredi rabbi who performed the marriage, since he was but a single witness, and two witnesses are required to establish proof in Jewish law. He continued along this vein until he concluded that there was enough uncertainty in the case to remove the label of mamzerut from the daughter, and allow her to marry into the Jewish people.

שו׳ת יביע אומר, חלק ז, אה׳ע סימן ו

The rabbinic attitude towards mamzerut demonstrates that there really has never been a single rabbinic attitude towards the problem. Some made the life of the mamzer extraordinarily difficult, and even suggested that the mamzer had physical or character flaws. One even suggested that the mamzer be tattooed as a warning to others. But others went to great efforts to remove the need to categorize any person as a mamzer. Let’s end with a reminder that in classic Jewish teaching, the mamzer can rise to great religious heights, regardless of the actions of his or her parents.

משנה הוריות ג, ח

מַמְזֵר תַּלְמִיד חָכָם קוֹדֵם לְכֹהֵן גָּדוֹל עַם הָאָרֶץ

But if there were a mamzer who is a Torah scholar and a High Priest who is an ignoramus, a mamzer who is a Torah scholar is rescued before a High Priest who is an ignoramus, as Torah wisdom surpasses all else.

Bava Basra 74a ~ Where Heaven and Earth Touch

In honor of the birthday of my dear wife, Erica, who has taught me how to see the heavens and focus on the earth.

While discussing the legal technicalities involved in buying a boat, the Talmud digresses with a series of fantastic stories about boats, told by Rabbah bar bar Chanah.  And then it digresses again with a series of  fantastic stories about all kinds of things, also told by Rabbah bar bar Channah. In total he told fifteen stories. Here is the last one:

בבא בתרא עד, א

אמר לי תא אחוי לך היכא דנשקי ארעא ורקיעא אהדדי שקלתא לסילתאי אתנחתא בכוותא דרקיעא אדמצלינא בעיתיה ולא אשכחיתה אמינא ליה איכא גנבי הכא אמר לי האי גלגלא דרקיעא הוא דהדר נטר עד למחר הכא ומשכחת לה

An Arab also said to me: Come, I will show you the place where the earth and the heavens touch each other. I took my basket and placed it in a window of the heavens. After I finished praying, I searched for it but did not find it. I said to him: Are there thieves here? He said to me: This is the heavenly sphere that is turning around; wait here until tomorrow and you will find it again.

What should we make of this?  We should begin by considering its context, noting that it is part of a series of fantastic fables.  These include a man who pursued a demon on horseback, antelope the size of mountains, giant frogs ("the size of sixty houses") that are eaten by even more giant birds, a fish so large it took three days to sail between its fins, and scorpions the size of donkeys. You get the idea. Given this context, perhaps the tale of a place where heaven and earth touch as a description of reality should be taken with as much seriousness as the other stories. Which is to say, not very seriously at all. 

Other Talmudic descriptions of the Cosmos

Not so fast. There are other rabbis in Talmud who address the structure of the earth and the cosmos. Rabbi Natan noted that the stars do not seem to change in their positions overhead when walking far distances.  The assumption underlying his explanation for this observation was that the earth is flat. Covering the earth was an opaque cap referred to as the rakia, which is most commonly translated as the sky or firmament. Rava, a fourth-century Babylonian sage who lived on the banks of the river Tigris, determined this cap to be 1,000 parsa in width, while Rabbi Yehudah thought that he had over-estimated this thickness. There were others who added to the picture of the sky; Resh Lakish announced that it actually was made up of seven distinct layers. Given this model, there would have to be a place where the opaque cap touched the earth, a place that Rabbah bar Bar Channah claimed to have touched.  So even allowing for a degree of talmudic fantasy, this fable was clearly built on the model that was shared by other rabbis in the Talmud.

The Flammarion Engraving

In 1872, Camille Flammarion published L'atmosphère: météorologie populaire (The Atmosphere: Popular Meteorology). In the 1888 edition this engraving  appeared on page 163:

As you can see from the caption, the engraving is "A missionary of the Middle Ages tells that he had found the point where the sky and the Earth touch." The engraving appears to have been specially created for Flammarion's book. The text that precedes it reads as follows:

Whether the sky be clear or cloudy, it always seems to us to have the shape of an elliptic arch; far from having the form of a circular arch, it always seems flattened and depressed above our heads, and gradually to become farther removed toward the horizon. Our ancestors imagined that this blue vault was really what the eye would lead them to believe it to be; but, as Voltaire remarks, this is about as reasonable as if a silk-worm took his web for the limits of the universe. The Greek astronomers represented it as formed of a solid crystal substance; and so recently as Copernicus, a large number of astronomers thought it was as solid as plate-glass. The Latin poets placed the divinities of Olympus and the stately mythological court upon this vault, above the planets and the fixed stars. Previous to the knowledge that the earth was moving in space, and that space is everywhere, theologians had installed the Trinity in the empyrean, the glorified body of Jesus, that of the Virgin Mary, the angelic hierarchy, the saints, and all the heavenly host.... A naïve missionary of the Middle Ages even tells us that, in one of his voyages in search of the terrestrial paradise, he reached the horizon where the earth and the heavens met, and that he discovered a certain point where they were not joined together, and where, by stooping his shoulders, he passed under the roof of the heavens.

Flammarion does not reference his source for the missionary of the Middle Ages who, like Rabbah bar bar Channah, claimed to have found the place were the heavens and earth meet.  Despite this, his engraving has become very popular. A version of it appears on the cover of Daniel J. Boorstin's best selling work The Discoverers, and inside William Vollmann's Uncentering the Universe. And those are just the ones I know about from my own library. You can buy a color poster of it (where it is incorrectly described as a "medieval artwork") but if you are really dedicated you could always travel to San Fransisco where a tattoo parlor will create the image on your arm. 

We know that Rabbah bar bar Channah's model of the universe is not correct, but his suggestion of a place where heaven and earth touch is both endearing and enchanting.  (It is also the perfect name for an anthology of Midrash which was published back in 1983).  With Rosh Hashanah approaching, you may already be thinking about your wine list.  Perhaps you should consider a kosher wine whose label shows part of the Flammarion etching, and drink to the memory of Rabbah bar bar Channah. 

Bava Basra 73b ~ The Re'em

This post is for the page of Talmud to be studied tomorrow, Thursday.

The enormous Re'em

We are currently reading some fantastic stories (tangentially related to boats,) that were told by Rabbah bar bar Chanah.  The forth story is about the רימא, the re'em, an animal of enormous size. 

בבא בתרא עג, ב

אָמַר רַבָּה: לְדִידִי חֲזֵי לִי אוּרְזִילָא בַּר יוֹמֵיהּ, דַּהֲוָה כְּהַר תָּבוֹר. וְהַר תָּבוֹר כַּמָּה הָוֵי? אַרְבַּע פַּרְסֵי. וּמְשָׁאכָא דְצַוְּארֵיהּ תְּלָתָא פַּרְסֵי, וּבֵי מַרְבַּעְתָּא דְרֵישֵׁיהּ פַּרְסָא וּפַלְגָא. רְמָא כּוּפְתָּא, וּסְכַר לֵיהּ לְיַרְדְּנָא.

Rabba said: I have seen a day-old urzila that was as large as Mount Tabor. And how large is Mount Tabor? It is four parasangs. And the length of its neck was three parasangs, and the place where his head rests was a parasang and a half. It cast feces [kufta] and thereby dammed up the Jordan.

We cannot turn to Rashi to identify the word אוּרְזִילָא, because this tractate is one of the few on which Rashi did not write. (The others are Nedarim, Nazir, Mo’ed Kattan and the end of Makkos.) Instead we can turn to Rabbi Shmuel Ben Meir (the Rashbam, c. 1085 – c. 1158) who was Rashi’s grandson, and who provided this identification:

אורזילא בר יומא - ראם בן יום אחד דאותו היום נולד

- This is a one-day old re’em, for it was born on that day

The Re’em and Noah’s Flood

Elsewhere, the Talmud wonders, how did the re’em survive the Great Flood of Noah? (I know, weird question, but let’s keep going.) One possibility is that it fled to Israel, where, according to some, the waters of the flood did not reach. But there were other opinions that the Flood even reached Israel. In that case, how did the re'em survive? It could not have hid in Israel, and it would have been too big to fit inside the Ark. Rabbi Yochanan had an answer:

זבחים קיג, ב

 א"ר יוחנן ראשו הכניסו לתיבה והאמר מר מרבעתא דרישא פרסא ופלגא אלא ראש חוטמו הכניסו לתיבה

 Rabbi Yochanan says: They brought only the head of the cub into the ark, while its body remained outside. The Gemara asks: But didn't Rabba bar bar Chana say that the size of the place where its head rests was a parasang and a half? [Consequently, even its head alone would not fit into the ark.] Rather, they brought the edge, of its nose into the ark, so that it might breathe. 

OK, but what exactly is a re’em? Today on Talmudology we will answer this vexing question. First, some background.

The re'em in the Bible

The word ראם, re'em appears several times in the Hebrew Bible. Here, for example, is a verse from Deuteronomy (33:17) which describes the offspring of Joseph.

דברים לג: יז

בְּכ֨וֹר שׁוֹר֜וֹ הָדָ֣ר ל֗וֹ וְקַרְנֵ֤י רְאֵם֙ קַרְנָ֔יו בָּהֶ֗ם עַמִּ֛ים יְנַגַּ֥ח יַחְדָּ֖ו אַפְסֵי־אָ֑רֶץ וְהֵם֙ רִבְב֣וֹת אֶפְרַ֔יִם וְהֵ֖ם אַלְפֵ֥י מְנַשֶּֽׁה׃

Like a firstling bull in his majesty, He has horns like the horns of the re'em; With them he gores the peoples, The ends of the earth one and all. These are the myriads of Ephraim, Those are the thousands of Manasseh. 

The re'em is specifically identified by the great translator of the Bible Oneklos (~35-120 CE) as one of the species singled out in the Torah as being kosher:

דברים יד: ד–ה

 זֹ֥את הַבְּהֵמָ֖ה אֲשֶׁ֣ר תֹּאכֵ֑לוּ שׁ֕וֹר שֵׂ֥ה כְשָׂבִ֖ים וְשֵׂ֥ה עִזִּֽים׃ אַיָּ֥ל וּצְבִ֖י וְיַחְמ֑וּר וְאַקּ֥וֹ וְדִישֹׁ֖ן וּתְא֥וֹ וָזָֽמֶר׃

These are the animals that you may eat; the deer, the gazelle, the roebuck, the wild goat, the dishon, the antelope, the mountain sheep.

Onkelos translates that word דִישֹׁ֖ן into Aramaic as רֵימָא - the re'em. And then there is this passage from the Book of Job (39:9-12):

איוב לט:ט–יב

הֲיֹ֣אבֶה רֵּ֣ים עָבְדֶ֑ךָ אִם־יָ֝לִ֗ין עַל־אֲבוּסֶֽךָ׃ הֲ‍ֽתִקְשָׁר־רֵ֭ים בְּתֶ֣לֶם עֲבֹת֑וֹ אִם־יְשַׂדֵּ֖ד עֲמָקִ֣ים אַחֲרֶֽיךָ׃

Most English versions of this passage translate the word re'em as "wild ox"and so read: 

Would the wild ox agree to serve you? Would he spend the night at your crib?  Can you hold the wild ox by ropes to the furrow? Would he plow up the valleys behind you?

But not the King James Bible. It goes in an entirely different direction: 

Will the unicorn be willing to serve thee, or abide by thy crib? Cans’t thou bind the unicorn with his band in the furrow? or will he harrow the valleys after thee?

So according to the King James Bible, the re'em is a unicorn. Why on earth would the translators have chosen, of all creatures, the mythical unicorn as the re'em?

“The men who [produced the King James Bible], who pored over the Greek and Hebrew texts, comparing the accuracy and felicity of previous translations, arguing with each other over the finest details of chapter and verse, were many of them obscure at the time and are generally forgotten now, a gaggle of fifty or so black-gowned divines whose names are almost unknown but whose words continue to resonate with us.”

— Adam Nicoloson. God's Secretaries: The Making of the King James Bible. Harper Collins 2005. xi

The re'em is a unicorn. Or maybe not.

Well, they didn't. They merely followed the Septuagint, the Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible from the third century BCE. And the Septuagint translated the Hebrew re'em as μονόκερως - monokeros, or "one horned". Which is why the King James Bible translated it as a unicorn, from the Latin uni meaning "single" and cornu meaning "horn". And since, according to the Talmud, the Septuagint was created at the command of Ptolemy II by seventy-two Jewish sages, you could claim that the King James translation was following a long Jewish tradition.

“King Ptolemy once gathered 72 Elders. He placed them in 72 chambers, each of them in a separate one, without revealing to them why they were summoned. He entered each one’s room and said: “Write for me the Torah of Moshe, your teacher”. God put it in the heart of each one to translate identically as all the others did.”

— TB Megillah 9a-b

This translation made its way into later rabbinic commentary. For example, R. Dovid Kimche (1160-1235), in his dictionary of the Hebrew language called Sefer Hashorashim, wrote that the re'em has only one horn. And Abraham Yagel, (1553 – 1623), the Italian rabbi and exegete, mentioned a one-horned re'em that had been captured and brought to Portugal:

Book IV, ch. 45: 108a בית יער הלבנון 

ובימנו הובא בארץ פורטוגאלי מן האי האינדי׳ ראם אחד במצודה צדו אותו ומראה צורתו הביאו אח׳כ עוברי אורחות ימים והוא גדול מהפיל ומזרין בקסקשיו בכל עורו וקרן חזות עב על חוטמו אשר בו לחם מלחמות עם הפיל ועם שאר החיות

And in our days a re'em was brought to Portugal from India having been ambushed and trapped, and afterwards sea travellers reported how it looked. It is larger than an elephant and its scales cover all its skin. It has a thick horn on its nose which it uses in fights with the elephant and with other creatures...

As Natan Slifkin points out, what Yagel what was actually describing was a rhinoceros: "It was given to King Manuel of Portugal by Alfonso de Albuquerque, governor of Portuguese India. This was the first rhinoceros to be brought to Europe since Roman times, and it caused quite a sensation." Quite so.

But before we conclude that the re'em was a rhinoceros, there are a couple of problems. First, although it was once found in the Land of Israel, the rhinoceros remains so far discovered only go back to the Mousterian era, which ended about 35,000 years ago. That's quite a few years before the biblical period. Thus it is very unlikely that there were rhinoceri in Israel in the biblical period. And second, the re'em in the Bible is described as having two horns.  Two. "וְקַרְנֵ֤י רְאֵם֙ קַרְנָ֔יו" His horns are like the horns of the re'em" (Deut.33:17). So much for the rhinoceros or unicorn.

Artist's rendering of the aurochs. Is this the re'em mentioned in the Torah? From here.

A better candidate: The Aurochs

There is a better candidate for the mysterious re'em, but it is an animal neither you, nor I, nor anyone we know has ever seen. It is the aurochs, Bos primigenius, an enormous species of cattle that became extinct in 1627. The aurochs (pronounced oar-ox) weighed in somewhere around 1,500lb - or 700kg. That's certainly a big animal, though not as big as the Mount Tabor-sized beast described by Rabba bar bar Chana. It also has the added bonus of having two horns, just like the re'em described in the Torah. The suggestion that the re'em is the aurochs seems to have become popular with late nineteenth-century Christian scholars, as you can see here:

Sunday-School Teacher's Bible. Philadelphia, A.J Holman & Co. 1895. p115.

Matthew George Easton Illustrated Bible Dictionary. London, T. Nelson & Sons 1894. p678.

The Aurochs and the prehistoric cave paintings of Lasaux

Of all the animals that have intrigued human beings, perhaps none goes further back in time than the aurochs. Among the cave paintings of animals found in the Lasaux cave, are aurochs. And these paintings (there are nearly 6,000 of them) are from the Paleolithic period, 17,000 years ago.  The largest of the aurochs depicted there is over 15 feet long. There are similar paintings of the aurochs  in another cave system called La-Tete-Du-Lion in southern France, which has been dated to 26,000 BCE. We will, of course, never know with certainty whether the long-extinct aurochs was the re'em. But we have been fascinated with the aurochs for as long as we have walked the earth.  What better candidate could there be for the mysterious creature that somehow survived Noah's flood. 

Detail from the Lascaux cave drawing, about 17,000 years old.