Dear TBZ Community,
This is the last Shabbat of the year. It is always so powerful to see the connection between the Torah reading cycle and the year cycle. Parashat Nitzavim, the Torah portion we read this Shabbat, begins with Moses summoning all of the people of Israel to renew the covenant between God and God’s people.
In Deuteronomy 30:12 we read:
לֹא בַשָּׁמַיִם הִוא לֵאמֹר מִי יַעֲלֶה־לָּנוּ הַשָּׁמַיְמָה וְיִקָּחֶהָ לָּנוּ וְיַשְׁמִעֵנוּ אֹתָהּ וְנַעֲשֶׂנָּה
It is not in the heavens, that you should say, “Who among us can go up to the heavens and get it for us and impart it to us, that we may observe it?”
These words are a reminder that Torah is down here on earth and not in heaven; it is not far away, but close to us. It is part of the realm of human life and influence. Indeed, the rabbis even went so far as to say that Torah is within the realm of human authority.
There is a very well-known story in the Gemara (Talmudic commentary) which tells of a halachic (legal) dispute between Rabbi Eliezer and the sages on a question of ritual purity (tanuro shel achnai). We learn in Bava Metzia 59b that, despite Rabbi Eliezer’s strong arguments, the majority ruled against him. Rabbi Eliezer invoked heavenly miracles to support his position, causing a carob tree to move, a pool of water to flow backwards, and a wall to lean. Finally, a heavenly voice (bat kol) called out in explicit support of Rabbi Eliezer’s position. Yet Rabbi Yehoshua got up and pronounced: “Lo bashamayim hi” (“It is not in heaven”).
Rabbi Yehoshua’s statement is a very strong one. What does “It is not in heaven” mean in this context? What gives Rabbi Yehoshua the authority to reject the divine ruling? The Talmudic narrator makes this point again at the end of the story: When Rabbi Natan met Elijah, he asked him, “What did the Holy One do in that hour, while this dispute was occurring?” Elijah answered:
אֲמַר לֵיהּ: קָא חָיֵיךְ וְאָמַר, ״נִצְּחוּנִי בָּנַי! נִצְּחוּנִי בָּנַי״
“God laughed [with joy], saying: ‘My children have defeated Me, My children have defeated Me.’”
Rabbi Yehoshua is claiming the privilege that Moses offered along with the responsibilities. God gave the Torah to everyone. The Torah is brought down from Mount Sinai in order to make it ours. Once we have accepted the responsibility of Torah, the challenge that faces us is what we will make of it.
The main argument between Rabbi Yehoshua and Rabbi Eliezer is: who gets to decide? Does God decide? Does the majority decide?
But often we forget to tell what happened next in this story: the part of the story that warns us of what happens when disagreement grows too deep in discourse.
What happens next? The sages decide to ostracize, to cast out Rabbi Eliezer and distance themselves from him. Perhaps they knew the dangerous aspects of his voice – a voice not willing to yield to the will of the majority of sages, a voice that claimed absolute authority in the name of God.
Rabbi Akiva volunteers to go let him know what the sages have decided. He encounters a man who is full of rage:
כָל מָקוֹם שֶׁנָּתַן בּוֹ עֵינָיו רַבִּי אֱלִיעֶזֶר – נִשְׂרַף
Any place that Rabbi Eliezer fixed his gaze was burned.
Rabbi Eliezer’s anger was so great that even the waters of the sea were stirred, creating a storm that threatened Rabbi Gamliel, who had led the decision to ostracize him (and who was also his brother-in-law!).
The story ends in tragedy: Ima Shalom, Rabbi Gamliel’s sister and Rabbi Eliezer’s wife (her very name means mother of peace) was constantly on guard, making sure her husband did not pray, for she feared his prayers could bring destruction. Yet one day she was distracted for just a moment, and in that moment of distraction Rabbi Eliezer’s prayer brought about Rabbi Gamliel’s death.
But I want to pause on Rabbi Gamliel’s prayer, just before that moment, when the stormy waters threatened his life. He prayed:
רִבּוֹנוֹ שֶׁל עוֹלָם, גָּלוּי וְיָדוּעַ לְפָנֶיךָ שֶׁלֹּא לִכְבוֹדִי עָשִׂיתִי, וְלֹא לִכְבוֹד בֵּית אַבָּא עָשִׂיתִי, אֶלָּא לִכְבוֹדְךָ, שֶׁלֹּא יִרְבּוּ מַחֲלוֹקוֹת בְּיִשְׂרָאֵל
Master of the Universe, it is revealed and known before You that neither was it for my honor that I acted when ostracizing him, nor was it for the honor of the house of my father that I acted; rather, it was for Your honor—so that disputes will not proliferate in Israel.
שֶׁלֹּא יִרְבּוּ מַחֲלוֹקוֹת בְּיִשְׂרָאֵל
So that disputes will not proliferate in Israel.
Machloket (dispute and disagreement) lies at the heart of our Jewish tradition. Our rabbinic texts are built on the idea that disagreement is not a weakness but a source of learning, growth, and deeper understanding.
The tragedy of the story lies in the absoluteness with which the dispute is held. What began as a (from our modern eyes) relatively minor discussion about the impurity of an oven becomes the source of proving one another wrong. And in that proving, leads to pushing people away, which leads to anger and rage, which leads to tragedy.
Maybe we can pay attention to Rabbi Gamliel’s prayer and realize that his plea was not for disputes to disappear, but for their proliferation to end. Proliferation can mean “too many,” but it can also mean “what happens as a result of dispute.”
This feels especially relevant in our times, when polarization in our larger society and within our own communities tempts us to believe that by silencing those who think differently we will solve all problems. In truth, such silencing only deepens division and can lead to catastrophic results. Yes, there are decisions that must be made, and not everything can remain open to dispute. But the process of how disagreements are engaged between human beings, whether with humility or with absolutism, can make the difference between life-giving diversity and tragic destruction.
God laughs in the story, perhaps because God is outsmarted by the people. God understands that God gave us Torah for us to discern, not to claim authority by invoking God’s name (as Rabbi Eliezer does in his extreme stance). But I also imagine that God weeps: for the same people who discerned Torah also chose to dehumanize and shun the other, taking upon themselves the power to decide who is in and who is out.
Perhaps it is true that Torah is not in heaven. But Torah is also not in our hands to wield however we wish, to determine the fate of others.
In a different teaching in the Gemara, also in Eruvin, the verse is read another way:
רָבָא אָמַר: ״לֹא בַשָּׁמַיִם הִיא״ — לֹא תִּמָּצֵא בְּמִי שֶׁמַּגְבִּיהַּ דַּעְתּוֹ עָלֶיהָ כַּשָּׁמַיִם, וְלֹא תִּמָּצֵא בְּמִי שֶׁמַּרְחִיב דַּעְתּוֹ עָלֶיהָ כַּיָּם.
Rava said: “It is not in heaven” means that Torah is not to be found in someone who elevates his mind over it like the heavens, nor in someone who expands his mind over it like the sea (Eruvin 55a).
In other words: Lo bashamayim hi calls us to humility. Torah does not belong to those who think they are above it, nor to those who think they have mastered it completely.
What the rabbis who “won” the argument lacked in the story was humility. And the absence of humility led to the tragedy of Rabbi Gamliel’s death.
As we arrive at this last Shabbat of the year, with new possibilities before us, in a time when disputes and disagreements have become a source of so much pain, may we learn new ways to engage one another – with humility, with compassion, with the hope of creating communities and societies that truly see each other with kindness and respect.
May this Shabbat bring moments of stillness, clarity, and connection.
May we reach for one another gently, lovingly.
May all who are in pain or danger find safety and comfort.
May authoritarianism not rule in our lands.
May the remaining hostages in Gaza come home.
May no one, anywhere, lack food or water – the most basic essentials of life.
May people in our country not live in fear of being taken away.
May those working for peace be granted strength and courage.
Shabbat Shalom,
Rav Claudia