Pt1 Hillel’s Three Converts: Lessons in Patience, the Oral Torah, and the Golden Rule (Shabbat 31a)
Appendix: The Six Orders of the Mishnah and the Six Questions Asked in Divine Judgment
This is the first part of a two-part series. The outline of the series is below.
Outline
Hillel Convert Story #1: A Lesson on Trust in Tradition and the Necessity of the Oral Torah1
Hillel Convert Story #2: Request for a Summary of the Torah “On One Foot”
Hillel Convert Story #3: From Aspiration for High Priesthood to Embracing Being a Commoner
The Three Converts Meet
Appendix: The Six Orders of the Mishnah and the Six Questions Asked in Divine Judgment
Reish Lakish connects the verse in Isaiah 33:6 to the six orders of the Mishnah
The Six Questions Asked in Divine Judgment: Honesty, Torah Study, Procreation, Anticipation of Salvation, Wisdom, and Understanding
The Passage
Hillel Convert Story #1: A Lesson on Trust in Tradition and the Necessity of the Oral Torah
Part 1: Shammai vs. Hillel
A non-Jew approached Shammai (fl. early 1st century CE), asking to convert to Judasim on the condition he would be taught only the Written Torah (תורה שבכתב - i.e. the Bible), as he accepted its authority but rejected the Oral Torah (i.e. the rabbinic/Pharisaic interpretations of the Bible).2
Shammai scolded (נזיפה) him and sent him away.
The non-Jew then approached Hillel, who agreed to convert him.
תנו רבנן:
מעשה בגוי אחד
שבא לפני שמאי.
אמר לו: כמה תורות יש לכם?
אמר לו: שתים, תורה שבכתב ותורה שבעל פה.
אמר לו:
שבכתב אני מאמינך, ושבעל פה — איני מאמינך.
גיירני, על מנת שתלמדני תורה שבכתב.
גער בו, והוציאו בנזיפה.
בא לפני הלל, גייריה.
The Sages taught:
There was an incident involving one gentile
who came before Shammai.
The gentile said to Shammai: How many Torahs do you have?
He said to him: Two, the Written Torah and the Oral Torah.
The gentile said to him:
With regard to the Written Torah, I believe you, but with regard to the Oral Torah, I do not believe you.
Convert me on condition that you will teach me only the Written Torah.
Shammai scolded him and cast him out with reprimand.
The same gentile came before Hillel, who converted him
Part 2: Post-Conversion - Trusting Tradition: Hillel's Lesson on the Necessity of Oral Torah
Hillel began teaching the new convert the Hebrew alphabet (א״ב ג״ד), presenting it correctly on the first day but reversing it the next.3
When the convert questioned the change, Hillel explained that the alphabet requires reliance on oral tradition to be understood. He urged the convert to trust him similarly regarding the traditions and interpretations of the Oral Torah.4
יומא קמא, אמר ליה: א״ב ג״ד.
למחר, אפיך ליה.
אמר ליה: והא אתמול לא אמרת לי הכי!
אמר ליה:
לאו עלי דידי קא סמכת?
דעל פה נמי סמוך עלי.
On the first day, he showed him the letters of the alphabet and said to him: Alef, bet, gimmel, dalet.
The next day he reversed the order of the letters and told him that an alef is a tav and so on.
The convert said to him: But yesterday you did not tell me that.
Hillel said to him:
You see that it is impossible to learn what is written without relying on an oral tradition. Didn’t you rely on me?
Therefore, you should also rely on me with regard to the matter of the Oral Torah, and accept the interpretations that it contains.
Hillel Convert Story #2: Request for a Summary of the Torah “On One Foot”
A non-Jew approached Shammai, asking to be converted on the condition that he be taught the entire Torah while standing on one foot. Shammai, a builder, dismissed him5 with a measuring stick (אמת הבנין).
The same non-Jew then approached Hillel, who converted him, summarizing the Torah as: "What is hateful (סני) to you, do not do to another" (i.e. the Golden Rule), with the rest being interpretation (פירושה) that requires study.
שוב מעשה בגוי אחד
שבא לפני שמאי.
אמר לו: גיירני, על מנת שתלמדני כל התורה כולה, כשאני עומד על רגל אחת
דחפו באמת הבנין שבידו.
בא לפני הלל, גייריה.
אמר לו:
דעלך סני, לחברך לא תעביד
זו היא כל התורה כולה,
ואידך פירושה הוא,
זיל גמור.
There was another incident involving one gentile
who came before Shammai
and said to Shammai: Convert me on condition that you teach me the entire Torah while I am standing on one foot.
Shammai pushed him away with the builder’s cubit in his hand. This was a common measuring stick and Shammai was a builder by trade.
The same gentile came before Hillel. He converted him
and said to him:
That which is hateful to you do not do to another;
that is the entire Torah,
and the rest is its interpretation.
Go study.
On some previous parts of this aggadic sugya, see my recent series: “The Biblical Books Nearly Suppressed: Reconciling Contradictions in Ecclesiastes and Proverbs (Shabbat 30b)“, final part here.
תורה שבעל פה.
See Wikipedia, “Oral Torah“:
“According to Rabbinic Judaism, the Oral Torah or Oral Law (Hebrew: תּוֹרָה שֶׁבְּעַל־פֶּה, romanized: Tōrā šebbəʿal-pe) are statutes and legal interpretations that were not recorded in the Five Books of Moses, the Written Torah (תּוֹרָה שֶׁבִּכְתָב, Tōrā šebbīḵṯāv, '"Written Law"'), and which are regarded by Orthodox Jews as prescriptive and given at the same time [...]
According to Rabbinic Jewish tradition, the Oral Torah was passed down orally in an unbroken chain from generation to generation until its contents were finally committed to writing following the destruction of the Second Temple in 70 CE, when Jewish civilization was faced with an existential threat, by virtue of the dispersion of the Jewish people.
The major repositories of the Oral Torah are the Mishnah, compiled between 200–220 CE by Judah ha-Nasi, and the Gemara, a series of running commentaries and debates concerning the Mishnah, which together form the Talmud, the preeminent text of Rabbinic Judaism [...]
Belief that at least portions of the Oral Torah were transmitted orally from God to Moses on Biblical Mount Sinai during the Exodus from Egypt is a fundamental tenet of faith of Orthodox Judaism, and was recognized as one of the Thirteen Principles of Faith by Maimonides.
There have also been historical dissenters to the Oral Torah, most notably the Sadducees and Karaites, who claimed to derive their religious practice only from the Written Torah.
Compare also my series “ ‘The likes of which were not said even in the days of Yehoshua bin Nun’: Talmudic Homiletics on the Hebrew Alphabet (Shabbat 104a)“, final part here.
One can ask whether Hillel’s demonstration sufficiently justifies trust in the entire Oral Torah. Just because the alphabet example reveals the need for some basic guidance, does it follow that the Oral Torah is valid in its entirety?
The argument assumes a leap from trusting a teacher in one domain to accepting a vast corpus of tradition, which seems to demand more evidence or reasoning than the story provides.
דחפו - literally: “pushed him”.