The sages taught in a beraita: If there are trees in the idolatrous city that are detached from the ground, they are forbidden (and must be burned); if they are attached to the ground they are permitted (i.e., not destroyed). By contrast, trees of another city, whether detached or attached, are forbidden. 

This last statement is curious: What is the “other city”? What city suffered a destruction so complete it lost not only its inhabitants and their property but even its rooted trees? For the answer, the rabbis reach deep into biblical history for what is perhaps, next to Sodom, the most legendary account of a city destroyed:

Rav Hisda says that city is Jericho, as it is written: “And the city shall be devoted, it and all that is in it, to the Lord … And Joshua charged them at that time by oath, saying: The man that rises up to build this city, Jericho, shall be cursed before the Lord; Jericho’s foundations shall be laid at the cost of his first-born, and its gates set up at the cost of his youngest.” (Joshua 6:17, 26)

Joshua’s curse is frightful: Not only is Jericho to be laid waste, but anyone who attempts to rebuild it will be punished with the death of their own beloved children. In 1 Kings 16, this actually happened. Hiel, a subject of King Ahab, tried to rebuild Jericho, and as a consequence two of his sons died.

The Gemara on today’s daf imagines a difficult discussion that took place in that solemn house of mourning for Hiel’s sons. Hiel bemoans that his children have died in accordance with Joshua’s curse, and the prophet Elijah confirms it is so. But Ahab has a different take:

Ahab said to Elijah: “Now the curse of Moses is not fulfilled, as it is written: ‘And you go astray and worship other gods,’ and it is written: ‘Then the Lord’s anger will flare against you, and He will close the heavens, and there will be no rain.’ (Deuteronomy 11:16–17) And that man (referring to himself) established an object of idol worship on each and every furrow in the kingdom of Israel, and the rain is so plentiful that it does not allow him to go and worship it. So will the curse of his student, Joshua, really be fulfilled?”

Ahab points out that Moses cursed the Israelites too, declaring that idolatry would prevent rain from falling. Yet Ahab himself set up idolatrous worship and rain remained plentiful. If Moses’ curse was ineffective, Ahab argues, then perhaps Joshua’s was as well.

According to the rabbis, this discussion inspired Elijah to immediately ask God for the keys to the rain. When God grants them, Elijah himself locks up the heavens — effectively fulfilling Moses’ curse and causing enormous suffering throughout the land.

This deceptively simple story wrestles with an anxiety about the most terrible and consequential punishments — whether they are just and whether they will actually be meted out. It is an anxiety that has run throughout Tractate Sanhedrin, as we have seen the rabbis consistently assert that sanctioned courts not only have permission, but a duty to execute people who violate certain commandments. At the same time, the rabbis have consistently circumscribed the practical power of the courts to do so. This tendency reached its logical conclusion a few days ago when a beraita, later ascribed to Rabbi Eliezer, declared that no city ever was or ever will be declared an idolatrous city. That ultimate punishment, as far as the rabbis are concerned, is purely theoretical.

Today’s story of Hiel, Ahab and Elijah suggests that God shares the rabbis’ anxiety. As Ahab rightly points out, God did not fulfill the terms of Moses’ curse. It was Elijah who fulfilled it. And even this punishment was ultimately short-circuited when God wished to alleviate another kind of suffering, as the story concludes:

And it is written: “And it came to pass after these matters, that the son of the woman, the mistress of the house, became sick.” (I Kings 17:17) Elijah prayed for mercy, for God to give him the key to the resurrection of the dead. They said to him from Heaven: Three keys are not typically passed to an agent: The key to a woman in childbirth, the key to rainfall, and the key to the resurrection of the dead. People will say: Two keys are in the possession of the student and one key is in the possession of the Master. Bring Me this key to rainfall, and take this key to the resurrection of the dead. Due to Elijah’s request, he was forced to revoke his oath, as it is written: “Go, appear before Ahab; and I will give rain.” (I Kings 18:1)

So that Elijah can resurrect the righteous woman’s dead son, God grants him the key to resurrection, but in so doing takes back the key to rainfall because it is inappropriate for Elijah to have two of God’s three special keys. As soon as Elijah relinquishes the key to the rain, precipitation returns to Ahab’s idolatry-ridden kingdom. God opts for mercy for the woman’s son over punishment for an entire idolatrous country.

It is difficult to contemplate terrible crimes. But it may be even more difficult to contemplate terrible punishments. In this final story of Tractate Sanhedrin, we see that God, confronted with a choice between justice and mercy, chooses mercy for a single person even at the expense of letting an entire city of idolaters escape punishment. 

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Today, on Sanhedrin 112, the Gemara discusses the manner in which such a city is collectively found guilty of idolatrous worship: Local judges examine the witness testimony and evidence for each defendant individually, including whether they were warned not to engage in idol worship, before handing down a verdict. 

But now our tractate is about to come full circle, because the idolatrous city was also mentioned in the very first mishnah of this tractate. There, we learned a different procedure for dealing with its inhabitants:

A city may be designated as an idolatrous city only in accordance with the ruling of a court of 71 judges. 

How can we square this statement, that a great sanhedrin is required to declare a whole city idolatrous, with today’s mishnah which suggests local judges scrutinize individuals one-by-one? The Gemara explains: 

One increases the number of courts for them and those courts analyze their cases, and when they conclude that a majority of the inhabitants are guilty of idolatry they are not sentenced; instead, we take them to the great sanhedrin and that court issues the verdict of the idolaters and executes them.

Maimonides further harmonizes the two mishnahs, explaining that “The great sanhedrin sends emissaries who investigate and probe until they have established clear proof that the entire city — or the majority of its inhabitants — have turned to the worship of false gods. Afterwards, they send two Torah sages to warn them and to motivate them to repentance. If they repent, it is good. If they continue their wicked ways, the court commands the entire Jewish people to take up arms against them. They lay siege to the city and wage war against it until the city falls.”

Which leads us to one more question: Was there ever a city that was actually convicted of idolatry and collectively punished? On Sanhedrin 71 we were told: 

In accordance with whose opinion is that which is taught in a beraita: There has never been an idolatrous city and there will never be one in the future, as it is virtually impossible to fulfill all the requirements that must be met in order to apply this halakhah? And why, then, was the passage relating to an idolatrous city written in the Torah? So that you may expound upon new understandings of the Torah and receive reward for your learning. In accordance with whose opinion is this? It is in accordance with the opinion of Rabbi Eliezer, as it is taught in a beraita that Rabbi Eliezer says: Any city that has even one mezuzah or any other sacred scroll cannot become an idolatrous city.

This fits a pattern we have seen throughout the tractate: The rabbis’ standards for conviction in capital cases are often so stringent it is difficult to imagine they would ever be met. In the case of the idolatrous city, we don’t have to assume. Rabbi Eliezer positively asserts not only have the standards never been met — they never will.

Which raises another interesting question: If we know a city will never be found guilty of idolatry, why do we need the law at all? According to Rabbi Eliezer, the reason that the Gemara discusses the idolatrous city at all is not to imply that it’s possible for a city to be judged as wholly idolatrous, but rather in order to allow scholars to study the matter since it appears in the Torah. Study of the law — even laws that are wholly impractical — is a good thing all on its own. That’s a bracing thought for those of us making our way through Daf Yomi!

Let’s linger on one last idea: Although the definition of a subverted city is one in which the majority of inhabitants are idol worshippers, Rabbi Eliezer expresses the opinion that even one household that has a mezuzah on its doorpost or another biblical scroll in its possession is enough to save the entire city from destruction. This means a single citizen can take a simple act to save the city. Or, as anthropologist and author Margaret Mead famously said, “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has.”

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Last on the long list of people who, according to the Talmud, do not have a place in the World to Come, are residents of an idolatrous city:

The residents of an idolatrous city have no share in the World to Come, as it is stated: “Certain men, wicked persons, are gone out from your midst, and have subverted the inhabitants of their city, saying: Let us go and let us worship other gods.” (Deuteronomy 13:14)

As they have done regularly in Tractate Sanhedrin, the rabbis adopt a literal understanding of the verse which allows them to limit the possibility that a town will actually fall into this category. For example, because the verse says the subverters have come from our midst, the rabbis require that the people of the town be led astray by their fellow townspeople who are from the same tribe.

Once a city is found guilty of being an idolatrous one, it is destroyed. What happens to the land afterward is a matter of a rabbinic dispute:

It is written: “And it shall be a heap forever.” (Deuteronomy 13:17), meaning the idolatrous city shall not be converted even into gardens and orchards. This is the statement of Rabbi Yosei HaGelili. 

Rabbi Akiva says: From the end of that verse: “It shall not be built again,” it is derived that to restore it to the way it was before destruction, it may not be built; but it may be converted into gardens and orchards. 

According to Rabbi Yosei HaGelili, the fate of an idolatrous city is to be a heap of rubble for all of time. But Rabbi Akiva maintains that while the town may not be actively rebuilt, it can be rezoned for agricultural purposes. (This debate does not take up much ink in the Talmud or later legal commentaries, but Maimonides sides with Rabbi Akiva, allowing the land to be repurposed.)

Back in Tractate Berakhot, which covered all manner of blessings, we learned the blessing recited upon seeing a place from which idol worship was eradicated:

“Blessed are You, God, Ruler of the Universe, Who eradicated idolatry from our land.”

The Gemara in Berakhot suggested that we tack on the following:

“Just as it was eradicated from this place, so too may it be eradicated from all places of Israel, and restore the hearts of their worshippers to worship You.”

Reading today’s daf, I wondered: How would you even know when you’ve come upon a place from which idolatry has been eradicated? If we follow Rabbi Yosei HaGelili, and forbid any kind of rebuilding on the site of a condemned city, the rubble itself serves as a marker that idol worship was once practiced there and has since been removed. But the law follows Rabbi Akiva which means that, in time, destroyed cities likely become parks, gardens or orchards. In this case, the memory of the idolatry is nearly guaranteed to fade, as that piece of land becomes beautiful, productive and otherwise unremarkable. Perhaps ultimately this is better — a step toward the creation of a more perfect world, rather than a permanent scar attesting to human error. Unless, of course, you too, like my friend, are looking for your chance to bless God in all the ways the rabbis imagined a person could.

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The Gemara on todays daf brings a beraita that records a dispute parallel to the one found in our mishnah:

The sages taught: The generation of the wilderness have no share in the World to Come, as it is stated: “In this wilderness they shall be consumed, and there they shall die.” (Numbers 14:35) “They shall be consumed” indicates in this world; “and there they shall die” indicates for the World to Come. And the verse states with regard to them: “Wherefore I took an oath in My anger that they should not enter into My rest.” (Psalms 95:11) — This is the statement of Rabbi Akiva.

Rabbi Eliezer says: They come to the World to Come, as it is stated: “Gather My pious together to Me, those that have entered into My covenant by offering.” (Psalms 50:5) But how do I interpret the phrase “Wherefore I took an oath in My anger”? It must be understood: In My anger I took an oath, and I reconsidered.

The generation of the wilderness refers, broadly, to those who were adults when leaving Egypt, and who died in the wilderness without reaching the land. On the one hand, these are the people who make mistake after mistake. The Book of Numbers reads like a tragicomedy of ruptures and failures, the relationship between God, Moses and the people being tested time and time again. But this is also the generation that stood at Sinai, that saw God revealed before them at the splitting of the sea, that traveled with God constantly in their midst. This generation is a complex mix of rebellious and holy, responsible for both foundational covenant and foundational sin. 

This confusing mix of extremes explains the ambivalence reflected in the mishnah and beraita. Rabbi Akiva points to the language of God’s harsh decree — an excess in language that (he interprets) applies not only to barring them from the land, but to barring them from the World to Come. This is the generation that provoked God so frequently and so furiously that God swore to never grant them final repose.

Rabbi Eliezer, on the other hand, seizes upon this generation as the generation of the covenant, those who were brought into an eternal pact with God, and given an eternal promise. Though God may have lashed out against them in anger, God can repeal even divine oaths.

If you know Rabbi Akiva and Rabbi Eliezer, their positions are surprising in light of their personalities. Rabbi Eliezer was known for being unyielding and unforgiving. Rabbi Akiva was known to extol the power of teshuvah, repentance. Fascinatingly, the amoraim, rabbis of much later generations, also comment on this:

Rabba bar bar Hana says that Rabbi Yohanan says: Rabbi Akiva abandoned his piety, as it is stated with regard to the generation of the wilderness: “Go and cry in the ears of Jerusalem saying, so says the Lord: I remember for you the affection of your youth, the love of your espousals, how you went after Me in the wilderness, in a land that was not sown.” (Jeremiah 2:2) Now, if others come into the World to Come in the merit of the generation that left Egypt and followed God in the wilderness, is it not all the more so that the generation of the wilderness themselves have a share in the World to Come?

For Rabbi Yohanan, there’s a verse that clearly wins the interpretive battle. In words relayed by the prophet Jeremiah, God recalls the wilderness generation with love because they willingly followed God into the hazardous unknown for the sake of the covenant, which allowed future generations to partake in the World to Come. If this merit enables future generations to be forgiven and enter the World to Come, all the more so the wilderness generation! For these amoraim, while they acknowledge the iniquities and complexity of this generation, they ultimately view its devotion and covenantal relationship as its defining characteristic. The generation that died in the wilderness may not have seen the promised land, but they will see the World to Come.

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One day the Jewish people sought to send a gift to the emperor. They said: “With whom shall we send it? We will send it with Nahum of Gam Zu, as he is experienced in miracles.”

When Nahum Ish Gam Zu reached a certain inn, he sought to sleep there. They said to him: “What do you have with you?” He said to them: “I am taking the head tax to the emperor.” 

Delivering a large amount of money to the emperor was no easy feat; it involved the usual risks of travel (illness, bandits, natural disasters) and the political risks of interacting with a capricious and often hostile leader. Who better to take on this task than a perpetual optimist with experience in miracles? However, Nahum’s optimism shades over from apparently unwarranted to seemingly downright foolish. After all, it is obviously unwise to announce to a roomful of strangers at an inn that one is carrying a chest-load of cash. What happened next should have been predictable:

They rose in the night, opened his chest, took everything that was in it and filled it with earth.

When Nahum Ish Gam Zu arrived there (in Rome), earth was discovered in the chest. The emperor said: “The Jews are mocking me.” They took Nahum out to kill him. Nahum said: “This too is for the best.” 

The collected money of the Jewish people was swapped out for dirt, presumably so that the chest would weigh as much as before and Nahum would not realize he’d been robbed. The Roman emperor, lacking either compassion or a sense of humor, did not receive a cask full of dirt with appreciation. Predictably, the emperor moved swiftly to execute our rabbinic hero.

Yet even in the face of certain death, Nahum’s optimism remained intact and he continued to declare that everything that had happened up until that point was for the best. And now, incredibly, we find out that it was:

Elijah the prophet came and appeared to them as one of Nahum’s traveling party. Elijah said to them: “Perhaps this earth is from the earth of Abraham our forefather, who would throw dust and it became swords, straw and it became arrows.” They examined the earth and discovered it was thus.

There was a province that the Romans were unable to conquer. They threw some of this earth upon that province and they conquered it.

They brought Nahum Ish Gam Zu into the treasury and said: “Take that which is preferable to you.” He filled his chest with gold.

Nahum’s unwavering belief that everything, however it appears in the moment, is ultimately for the good is confirmed when the prophet Elijah, a biblical miracle-worker who appears in Jewish folklore in nearly every age, intervenes on his behalf. Just as Pollyanna inspires the best in her townsfolk, Nahum brings out the best in Elijah, who is famously grumpy in the Hebrew Bible. The erstwhile worthless cask of dirt becomes an invaluable weapons cache, and the rabbi walks away with nary a scratch and a chest full of gold. (To modern readers, there is irony in that the miraculous intervention on behalf of one oppressed people leads to the oppression of even more people in a previously unconquered province. But to the rabbis, Roman conquest and expansionism was the way of the world.)

Of course, this wouldn’t be a classic folktale without proper comeuppance, which happens when our hero is on his way back home:

When Nahum Ish Gamzu returned to that inn, those residents said to him: “What did you bring to the king’s palace?” Nahum said to them: “What I took from here, I brought to there.” They took more earth and brought it to the emperor who executed those residents.

Without the miraculous intervention of Elijah, the dirt under the inn was just dirt. The greedy thieves at the inn, who sought riches beyond those they had already stolen, got their just deserts.

In a world where everything around Nahum was telling him that people are cruel and selfish, his jaw-dropping belief in the goodness of the world might make us cringe on his behalf. And yet, it is that very faith that inspires Elijah’s enthusiastic aid and, through the prophet, the Roman emperor’s reward.

There is value in recognizing the world as it is, with all the challenges and problems that exist — after all, we can’t work to fix problems we don’t see. But on today’s daf, the Talmud reminds us that, at least sometimes, if we strive to see the world as Nahum did, that outlook can help change our reality too.

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Rabbi Yohanan says: This teaches that they bred domesticated animals with undomesticated animals, and all animals with humans.

If somebody told you that people were breeding goats with gazelles and then, far more shockingly, breeding humans with animals, you would probably think they had buried the lead. But the fact that Rabbi Yohanan doesn’t seem bothered by bestiality any more than the interbreeding of animal species suggests that he’s imagining a mythical past in which humans were considered just another species of animal.

This pattern continues on today’s daf. For instance, the Torah tells us that 40 days after the ark came to rest, Noah sent a raven in search of dry land. In the Talmud, we learn that the raven complained bitterly to Noah about this assignment:

Reish Lakish says: The raven provided a convincing response to Noah; when it did not wish to leave the ark the raven said to him: Your Master, God, hates me, and you hate me. Your Master hates me, as He commanded to take from the kosher species seven and from the non-kosher species two. And you hate me, as you disregard those from the species of seven (i.e., the kosher birds) and instead dispatch one from the species of two (i.e., the non-kosher birds). If the angel of heat or the angel of cold harms me and kills me, will the world not be lacking one species of creature, as there was only one pair of ravens? Or perhaps you are sending me because it is my wife that you need?

This bird talks, argues about Jewish law and, perhaps most importantly (speaking of burying the lead) sees Noah as romantic competition! Later on the daf, Noah also converses with the phoenix, who forgoes his food on the ark in order not to trouble his host. And the dove pleads with God to free him from any human control, stating he is willing to forgo feeding by humans:

Master of the universe, I would prefer my food to be as bitter as an olive but under your control, and not as sweet as honey and under the control of flesh and blood.

In this unusual collection of teachings, the rabbis present animals from the generation of the flood thinking strategically, weighing the long-term consequences of their actions and conducting emotionally weighty conversations with humans and even God. This is not our experience of animals, nor was it the norm for the rabbis to imagine them this way. Like the Bible, the rabbis rarely tell stories of talking animals.

Strikingly, we also find passages on the daf that take the opposite approach to animal life, seeing it as subordinate to human life. For example, Gemara wonders why God would choose a form of destruction which wiped out animal life, and not just humanity, and a beraita attributed to Rabbi Yehoshua ben Karha explains:

This is comparable to a man who made his son a wedding canopy, and prepared all manner of foods. Later, his son died. The man went and destroyed the wedding canopy, saying, “I only did this for my son. Now that he has died, why should I have a wedding canopy?” So to, the Holy Blessed One said, “I only created animals for the benefit of humans. Now that humans have sinned, why should I have animals?”

According to this radically different approach, animals are not agents of their own fate, subject to divine reward or punishment. They are simply an asset for human beings.

In the Torah, the flood narrative ends with God permitting Noah and humankind to eat animals. According to some rabbinic voices, this represents a new approach, the first humans having been instructed to follow a plant-based diet. In more ways than this, the rabbis identify the flood as the moment in which the world moves from a mythical prehistory, in which animals speak, argue and act on par with humans, to a more recognizable era, in which humans and human societies dominate other species. This isn’t a far cry from evolutionary history as we understand today, in which humans slowly distinguished themselves from their animal peers, and eventually came to control more and more of their environment.

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But this is hardly the only or worst sin recorded in the historical books of the Prophets, and it doesn’t explain why Gehazi received no share in the World to Come. The Gemara explains:

As it is written: “And Elisha went to Damascus.” (see 2 Kings 8:7) Where did he go, and for what purpose? Rabbi Yohanan says: He went to cause Gehazi to repent, but he did not repent. Elisha said to him: “Repent.” Gehazi said to him: “This is the tradition that I received from you: Whoever sins and causes the masses to sin is not given the opportunity to repent.”

The Gemara asserts that after the terrible Naaman affair, Elisha petitioned Gehazi to repent. Startlingly, Gehazi insisted that repentance was impossible according to Elisha’s own teaching that one who sins and causes the masses to sin as well has no opportunity for repentance. This assertion is somewhat baffling. While cheating Naaman was contemptible, it does not appear to have provoked “the masses” to do anything. The Gemara explains:

What did he do? There are those who say that he hung a magnetic rock on Jeroboam’s sin (i.e., the golden calf that Jeroboam established as an idol) so that he suspended it between heaven and earth. And there are those who say that he engraved the sacred name of God on its mouth, and it would declare and say: “I am the Lord your God,” (Exodus 20:2) and: “You shall not have other gods.” (Exodus 20:3)

The rabbis weave additional lore to explain Gehazi’s judgment. It’s not just that he exploited Elisha’s miracle to cheat the general Naaman; he also incited people to worship the golden calf erected by the wicked King Jeroboam. Apparently he performed a magic trick — either suspending the calf with a magnet so it appeared to be floating, or causing it to speak, perversely, verses about God’s singularity — and in so doing, he made the calf seem miraculous, and prompted others to worship its power. This is why he did not qualify, according to Elisha’s teaching, to repent.

The Gemara next suggests yet another narrative of Gehazi’s wrongdoing:

And there are those who say: Gehazi pushed the sages away from coming before him (i.e., he prevented them from learning from Elisha) as it is stated: “And the sons of the prophets said to Elisha, behold this place where we are staying before you is too cramped for us.” (2 Kings 6:1) It may be derived by inference that until now they were not numerous and the place was not cramped for them.

Perhaps, muse the rabbis, while serving as Elisha’s servant, Gehazi discouraged sages from coming and learning before him; this is why those studying with him suddenly multiplied once Gehazi was gone. 

Was all this enough to take from Gehazi his portion in the World to Come? In order to explain how Gehazi could be grouped among the worst of the worst, the rabbis spun out stories of misdeeds not found explicitly within the Hebrew Bible. Yet even with these proposed explanations, it’s not still clear what makes Gehazi uniquely more sinful than many of the other misled individuals of his generation. Perhaps for this reason, the sages place some of the blame on Gehazi’s teacher, the prophet Elisha:

The sages taught: Always have the left hand drive sinners away and the right draw them near. This is unlike Elisha, who pushed away Gehazi with his two hands and caused him to lose his share in the World to Come, and unlike Yehoshua ben Perahya, who pushed away Jesus the Nazarene with his two hands.In general, the sages say, we should rebuke sinners without completely expelling people from the fold; we should find a way to hold people accountable for their transgressions while encouraging a reparative approach — teshuvah — rather than a punitive one. Gehazi and, fascinatingly, Jesus, are presented as examples of people whom this approach would have benefited. The fact that Gehazi has no share in the World to Come, the Gemara asserts, is a failure — but not entirely his. Had Elisha both reproved him and allowed for the chance of repentance, Gehazi might also have earned his share.

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On yesterday’s daf, we began a discussion of four private individuals who, according to the Mishnah, have no share in the World to Come. The first is the gentile prophet Balaam who was hired by a Moabite king to curse the Israelites. Due to divine (and asinine, in the original sense of the word) intervention, he instead delivered a series of blessings, including Mah Tovu, which Jews subsequently incorporated into their liturgy. The analysis of Balaam’s words spills over onto today’s daf:

Rabbi Shmuel bar Nahmani says that Rabbi Yonatan says: What is the meaning of that which is written: “Faithful are the wounds of a friend; but the kisses of an enemy are importunate” (Proverbs 27:6)? Better is the curse that Ahijah the Shilonite cursed the Jewish people than the blessing that Balaam the wicked blessed them. Ahijah the Shilonite cursed Israel with a reed, as it is stated: “For the Lord shall smite Israel until it sways like a reed in water.” (I Kings 14:15) 

Ahijah the prophet lived during the reign of King Jeroboam of Israel and foretold the latter’s downfall. In his prophecy, Ahijah denigrated Israel by comparing them to a flimsy reed. By contrast, Balaam, though he intended to curse Israel, in fact blessed them with words that are likely familiar in part from morning liturgy: “How goodly are your tents, O Jacob, Your dwellings, O Israel! . . . Like cedars beside the water.”

These two botanical comparisons, the positive comparison to a cedar and the negative comparison to a reed, are put into conversation using the verse from Proverbs that affirms “wounds from a friend” (like Ahijah’s curse that Israel will be like reeds) are better than “kisses from an enemy” (Balaam’s blessing that they are like a cedars). Proverbs thereby suggests that the reed curse is superior to the cedar blessing. This gives the rabbis license to offer a different spin on the reed comparison:

Israel is just like a reed that stands in a place near water, as the water sustains it, and its stalk replenishes itself, as if it is cut another grows, and its roots are numerous. And even if all the winds that are in the world come and gust against it, they do not move it from its place and uproot it. Rather, it goes and comes with the winds. And once the winds subside the reed remains in its place.

The humble reed may not be as visibly majestic as the mighty cedar, but the Gemara notes it has many underrated attributes: flexibility, resilience, strong-rootedness. All of these can be ascribed to the Jewish people in a good way, even if Ahijah’s original intent was less than flattering. And the cedar?

They will be just like a cedar that does not stand in a place near water, and its roots are few relative to its height, and its trunk does not replenish itself, as if it is cut it does not grow back. And even if all the winds that are in the world come and gust against it, they do not move it from its place and uproot it; but once a southern wind gusts it immediately uproots the cedar and overturns it on its face. 

Although Balaam’s words were taken as a blessing, the comparison to the cedar may not be so positive: Despite its grandeur, the Gemara sees the cedar as ultimately vulnerable, ill-equipped to recover from many of the forces that assail it.

Contemporary sources and later commentators alike lean into this positive view of the humble reed and the comparison between this insignificant plant and the people of Israel. In a story on Ta’anit 20, Rabbi Elazar’s arrogance led to a public chastisement and his acknowledgement that “a person should always be soft like a reed, not stiff like a cedar.” In the 17th century, the Kli Yakar (Prague) remarked that reedy characteristics of the Jewish people have been essential to their very survival: “Torah exists only through those with humility like a reed and not like a person who is rigid like a cedar.”

Fittingly, then, Talmud concludes this sugya with a final tribute to the reed:

Moreover, it is the reed that was privileged to have a quill taken from it to write scrolls of Torah, Prophets and Writings.

In the text’s plain meaning, a reed quill has a place of honor as an essential tool for writing a sefer torah and other sacred texts. But the Maharsha (16th-17th centuries, Poland) goes even deeper: “Even if the reed is uprooted from its place, it still is privileged to have a quill taken from it for use in another context. So it is with Israel: Even in their exile and having been uprooted from their place, they are privileged to study Torah in their exile.” When the cedar is uprooted, he goes on to explain, it succumbs to fire and destruction, not unlike a nation that withers in diaspora. But Israel — just as the reed that is plucked to become a pen and write down new ideas — flourishes when it is uprooted.

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Numbers chapters 22-24 relates the story of the gentile prophet Balaam who was hired by the Moabite King Balak to curse the Israelites in order to prevent them from vanquishing his army. Though God advised him against it, Balaam accepted the commission. But when he and his talking donkey, who had also tried to stop him, arrived at the Israelite encampment and he opened his mouth to curse the Israelites, what emerged was a now-famous blessing: “How goodly are your tents, O Jacob, Your dwellings, O Israel!” (Numbers 24:5)

Since Balaam ultimately blessed the Israelites rather than cursing them, why did he forfeit his share in the World to Come? Several possible answers appear on our daf, including the charge that Balaam (and/or his father) had intimate relations with animals (“riding his donkey” can mean something else entirely here), or that Balaam engaged in sorcery using his sexual organ. Moving on from these prurient ideas, the Gemara continues with another interpretation: 

It is stated: “And Balaam rose in the morning and saddled his donkey.” (Numbers 22:21) It was taught in a beraita in the name of Rabbi Shimon ben Elazar: Love negates the standard conduct of those of prominence. This is derived from Abraham, as it is written: “And Abraham rose early in the morning and saddled his donkey.” (Genesis 22:3) This was atypical: He saddled the donkey himself and he did not wait for his servants. Likewise, hatred negates the standard conduct of those of prominence. This is derived from Balaam, as it is stated: “And Balaam rose early in the morning and saddled his donkey.” (Numbers 22:21)

Rabbi Shimon ben Elazar explains that people might rise early and rush to their tasks out of either love or hate. In the Akeda, the account of the binding of Isaac, Rabbi Shimon ben Elazar explains that Abraham saddled his donkey out of love in order to do God’s bidding. Balaam, in contrast, rose early due to his hatred for the nation of Israel — or, at least, in order to act in accordance with Balak’s enmity. It was ultimately this contempt for Israel that lost him a place in the World to Come.

Lest you think that all gentiles suffer the same fate, the Gemara explains:

It is in accordance with the opinion of Rabbi Yehoshua, as it is taught in a beraita that Rabbi Eliezer says: It is written: “The wicked shall be turned back to the netherworld, all the nations that forget God.” (Psalms 9:18) “The wicked shall be turned back to the netherworld” — these are the sinners of the Jewish people. “All the nations that forget God” — these are the sinners of the gentiles. This is the statement of Rabbi Eliezer. Rabbi Yehoshua said to him: But is it stated in the verse that the sinners of the Jewish people will be like all of the gentiles? It is stated only: “All the nations that forget God.” Rather, the wicked shall be turned back to the netherworld, and who are they? They are all the gentiles that forget God. 

The Hebrew word for nations found in Psalm 9:18 is goyim, a word that came to mean specifically non-Jewish nations — in other words, gentiles. This is the linguistic hook for the interpretations of Rabbi Eliezer and Rabbi Yehoshua. The first part of the verse, describing the fate of “the wicked,” they agree, refers to the fate of sinful Jews who are not granted a place in the World to Come. But the second part, which describes the fate of “the nations (goyim) that forget God” means, according to Rabbi Yehoshua, specifically gentiles who act contrary to God’s wishes — like Balaam. When deciding between following God or an earthly king, Balaam chose incorrectly, sealing his fate. 

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