d’var torah
DIRECTORIES What Will We Do
with a Rotten Torah?
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BY RABBI SHAI CHERRY
F www.

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JUNE 9, 2022 | JEWISHEXPONENT.COM
Parshat Naso
ull disclosure: I love Torah.

Deeply. Even at its worst.

Our parshah describes a mar-
riage gone sideways. Th e visual image
of this scenario in the wilderness is
a wind of jealousy sweeping over the
husband (Num. 5:14). He suspects his
wife of infi delity, but he can’t prove it.

He accuses, and she denies. What are
the options?
He could divorce her. Th at’s radical
— aft er all, her denials might be gen-
uine. Plus, divorce requires paying the
woman a divorce settlement as stipu-
lated in all marriage contracts.

Th ey could talk. But they’ve tried
talking. He accuses and she, once
again, denies. Th e wind of jealousy
continues to blow. No teapot is safe
from a tempest.

He could publicly accuse her of a
secret tryst. She will be mortifi ed, and
if she is found innocent of wrongdoing,
he will be humiliated as well. Th e elim-
ination of doubt, however, makes the
ordeal worthwhile.

He brings her to the Jerusalem
Temple, and a priest mixes water, dirt
and the dissolved ink of an incantation.

Th e priest’s use of the four-letter name
of God quickens the conditional curse
of the bitter waters. Th e woman says,
“Amen. Amen.” She drinks from the
goblet with all eyes upon her.

Should she be innocent, she will be
blessed with child. But should she have
been unfaithful, the waters will turn
bitter as they enter her defi led vessel.

Her moral impurity will poison her
from the inside out. Whatever seed that
might be within will be expelled, and
she’ll be rendered infertile forever.

And they live happily ever aft er. Th e
end. Maybe she’ll belch from the yucky
water. She’ll feel vindicated, and he’ll
feel like a jerk and buy her chocolates
and fl owers to make it up to her.

What’s to love about this? Th e Torah
fi gured out a way to keep the cou-
ple together by allowing the husband’s
jealousy to blow over. If the wife really
had been unfaithful, she gets off easy.

Th e punishment for adultery, when it
can be proven, is death. Th e Mishnah
brings in its own deus ex machina.

Let’s say Betsy, her neighbor, heard
the headboard banging against their
common wall. Both Betsy and the adul-
teress might wonder: “Are these bitter
waters just psychodrama therapy?” Th e
Mishnah anticipates such a question
by revealing that if the adulteress had
a whole slew of good deeds under her
belt, so to speak, the eff ects of the bitter
waters might be suspended for up to
three years.

But now the rabbis are in a pickle. If
women know of that exemption, some
might become righteous sluts. But if
they don’t know, some might suspect
that the ordeal is just for show. As I
said, I love Torah!
If we pull back the camera to see how
other ancient Near Eastern cultures
deal with their jealous husbands, we’ll
notice that their water ordeals involve
rivers and drowning. Even though the
bitter waters are ugly, there was uglier.

When I declare my love for Torah,
sometimes what I mean is that I love
how the rabbis of the Mishnah and
Talmud interpret the Torah in ways
that make it seem like they’re just
as bothered with the patriarchy and
misogyny of certain texts as I am.

Th e Mishnah begins its explanation
with its own act of interpretive magic:
Th e rabbis transform the Torah’s jeal-
ousy into a warning that the husband
issues his wife against being secluded
with a certain man, Ploni.

Th is warning, to have legal force,
must be issued in front of two wit-
nesses. In order for the husband to
bring his wife to the priest in Jerusalem,
not only must she be warned, but there
must be additional witness that she
then secluded herself with Ploni. She
was warned, and she persisted.

Th e Mishnah neutralizes the over-
reactive husband and gives the woman
the opportunity to avoid the ordeal.

For me, that was the obvious injustice
that the Mishnah needed to address.

It is the next act of interpretation that
makes me so proud to be an heir to this
radically righteous tradition.

What about Ploni? Th e paramour
goes unmentioned in the Torah, but
the rabbis drag him back in, kick-
ing and screaming. Th e Torah’s Ploni
gorges on forbidden fruit without con-
sequence. But in the Mishnah, if the
woman was guilty, so was Ploni, and
he suff ers the same consequences at the
same time. Gender parity through gen-
der parody.

It boggles my mind when my rab-
binic colleagues argue their point by
saying, “But, it is written …” and leave
it at that. What is written is a snapshot
of how Jewish values were applied in
that moment in that place. Our job as
rabbis, and as Jews, is not to idolize
the text by turning it into an object of
stone but to plant its values in our soil.

Th e rabbis knew that for the Torah not
to become petrifi ed wood, it had to be
a Tree of Life. JE
Rabbi Shai Cherry is the rabbi of
Congregation Adath Jeshurun in Elkins
Park and author of “Torah through Time:
Understanding Bible Commentary from
the Rabbinic Period to Modern Times”
and “Coherent Judaism: Constructive
Th eology, Creation, and Halakhah.” Th e
Board of Rabbis of Greater Philadelphia
is proud to provide diverse perspectives
on Torah commentary for the Jewish
Exponent. Th e opinions expressed in
this column are the author’s own and
do not refl ect the view of the Board of
Rabbis.