daf bit: Nedarim 39

[cellio]

The g'mara lists seven things that were created before the world:

• the torah: The Lord possessed me [sc. the Torah] in the beginning of his way, before his works of old. (Prov 8:22)
• repentance: Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever thou hadst formed the earth and the world . . . Thou turnest man to destruction, and sayest, Repent, ye sons of men. (Ps 90:2)
• Gan Eden: And the Lord God planted a garden in Eden from aforetime. (Gen 2:8)
• Gehenna: For Tophet (another name for Gehenna) is ordained of old. (Is 30:33)
• the Throne of Glory: Thy Throne is established from of old. (Ps 93:2)
• the Temple: A glorious high throne from the beginning is the place of our sanctuary. (Jer 17:12)
• the name of the Mashiach: His name [sc. of Messiah] shall endure for ever, and [has existed] before the sun! (Ps 72:17)¹

The g'mara is talking about this because of the punishment of Korach and his group; Moshe asked God for a miraculous punishment and the earth opened up and swallowed them. Surely we cannot say that God created Gehenna on the spot for this, because it already existed; therefore we understand that Moshe wasn't asking God to create Gehenna but, rather, to let its mouth draw near and open. (39b)

The Soncino translation has a note that elaborates the connections among these seven items (source unknown to me):

The general idea of this Baraitha is that these things are the indispensable prerequisites for the orderly progress of mankind upon earth. The Torah, the supreme source of instruction, the concept of repentance, in recognition that ‘to err is human’, and hence, if man falls, he needs the opportunity to rise again; the garden of Eden and the Gehenna symbolising reward and punishment, which, without conceding a purely utilitarian basis for ethical striving, are nevertheless powerful incentives thereto; the Throne of Glory and the Temple, indicating that the goal of creation is that the kingdom of God (represented by the Temple) should be established on earth as it is in Heaven; and finally, the name of Messiah, the assurance that God's purpose shall be eventually achieved.

¹ Before you ask: this last proof-text sounded unlikely to me, so I checked the text. As suggested above, "has existed" is interpretation, not in the text, and it seems pretty clear to me that the name being talked about is Solomon's, not the mashiach's. I don't know how the rabbis get from that verse to this interpretation.

Comments

[goljerp]

Yeah, I think of the Ram as a first-order member of the list, too -- perhaps because of the midrash I wrote about him. But I can see, from the Rabbi's point of view, the Ram wasn't as miraculous as the other miracles. After all, maybe the Ram was there all along, but Abraham just didn't see it. Or there's another midrash that the Ram got caught in the bushes just at the moment that Abraham needed it.

Tongs needing tongs: bootstrapping has been a problem since the first Shabbat. :-)