Physical Transformations

By: Jonathan Seidel

Rav Yehuda HaChasid and peshat absurdity 

        

R Yehuda Hachasid was a leader of the Rhineland pietists, a tosafist, and the rebbe of the great Maharam from Rothenburg. He was hailed as a spiritually powerful person. He was greater than the level of the prophets. His will, the tzavoes as they are called are an ethical will that though is seemingly superstitious have filtered into the Shulchan Aruch among other authorities. Such examples are not to burry two enemies next to each other, not to kiss a dead child, not to marry a women with same names as one’s mother. Many authorities say that whether a descendent or not, one should follow the will.    

His book Sefer Hasidim is filled with mystical and ethical elements. It is not a systematic effort of religion but moral maxims and religious themes for the pious individual. Not a treatise but a mussar-type of work. Hachasid was seemingly a proto-mussarnic who wished to develop further via a guided blueprint. The book expects high standards. Perfected attributes are central theme in the book. To deal honestly with others to a point of a gentile mistake should be compensated even if one is poor. Then there are areas of curiosity and superstition of werewolves and vampires. Despite the seeming irrationality, its push for personal growth is second to none. 

Beyond its seeming ethical and supernatural format, he makes a few starting theological claims elsewhere in his biblical commentary. He is more explicit that Ibn Ezra in asserting post-mosaic scholarship. His son attributes these opinions to him. In one example, Edom conquered Etzion Gaver later than the Pentatechal record but was inserted by the leaders of the great assembly for area transferral through royal marriages: thematic precedence over chronology. In another occasion, the leaders of the great assembly added this later referring to Moshe choosing Efraim over Menashe. In both of these cases he resorts to linguistic creativity. Finally, in Numbers, the full hallel was removed by King David. 

By and large, Yehuda Hachasid posited some controversial positions. Though these are only controversial to the contemporary thinker who is dogmatic in Maimonides’ eighth principle. Yet, it is normative amongst the Tosafist world. The literary feature in their peshat commentary encouraged these readings more than the christian mythology surrounding them. The post-mosaic assertions are in line with Ibn Ezra’s opinion and other French Tosafists. His opinion on werewolves is not too outlandish either. Rabbenu Ephraim quotes Binymain as a werewolf Chezkuni said Yishmael was one, Menachem Tzioni said that babel people turned into werwolves, Moshe Taku says elsewhere.

Hachasid goes beyond Ibn Ezra’s singular reading, like Rashbam there is a double interpretation. There is a deep peshat that transcends beyond. It is a mystically pushed metric that employs mystical elements that of werewolves. Their literal reading of the text and openness to mythical ideas was opposed by their Spanish counterparts but the anti-maimonidean frame and the kabbalistic interest in angelology and celestial metaphysics persisted. The anti-rationalistic perspective accepted radical unscientific definitions. It is clear that Hachasid’s piety wrapped in mysticism proved to these folklore ideas. This was a decisive break with traditional interpretation. The combination of peshat and mysticism in ashkenaz proved quite theologically interesting and even somewhat uniform.

R Feinstein infamously called Sefer Hasidim a forgery just as R Emden called the Guide a forgery (though this does not mean that forgeries do not exist, Berlin’s Bisamim Rosh is one example). Feinstein seemingly has a history of rejecting ideas that did not fit into his philosophy. Tzitz Eliezer even called him out on this. R Klein’s objection based on Tzioni’s testimony as Hachasid’s contemporary is valid evidence (though ironically, Klein argues that Feinstein was not the author of the forgery responsa). 

The quantity of shared opinions in medieval ashkenaz is navigated by a plain reading that is conjoined by a mystical presence in the light anti-rationalism. Today we see it negative light but we also have been convinced by the advent of science and rationalism in the modern age. His views were normative and readily accepted by his peers. His great prestige is highlighted. 

Ibn Ezra may have been the first bible critic but his ashkenazi successors followed suit linguistically. Peshat led to all kinds of semantic interpretations and then bolstered by mystical misappropriations. It deviates tremendously form the talmudic rabbis and only gave more power to academics to riddle the test with insufficiencies.