Re’eh parsha: Adding and subtracting from the Torah
The Torah tells us not to add to or subtract from the commandments (Deuteronomy 13:1). This directive seems to contravene the ongoing development of Jewish law on the part of the rabbis (17:8–13).
Consider, for example, one of the dietary laws. The Torah states that one may not eat meat and milk together (14:21). The rabbis extend the prohibition to include fowl and milk. Doesn’t this extension violate the prohibition on adding to the Torah? Maimonides posits that this extension may, in fact, violate the prohibition on adding to the Torah. He codifies that if one maintains that mixing fowl and milk is enjoined by Torah law, it would add to the Torah in violation of the prohibition.
However, if the rabbis declare that as a precaution – because of the similarity between fowl and meat – they rabbinically prohibit the consumption of fowl together with milk, it would not be a violation of adding to the law (Maimonides, Mishneh Torah, Laws of Rebels 2:9).
This idea helps explain an aspect of the Garden of Eden narrative. While God had only enjoined “eating from the tree,” Eve adds “touching.” As she tells the snake, “Of the tree in the midst of the garden, God has said: You shall not eat of it, neither shall you touch it, lest you die” (Genesis 3:3). The serpent, says the Midrash, then pushes Eve against the tree, declaring, “As you have not died from touching it, so you will not die from eating thereof” (Bereishit Rabbah 19:3). In the words of Rashi: “She added to the command [of God], therefore, she was led to diminish from it” (Rashi, Genesis 3:3, 4).
One could argue that Eve acted properly; after all, she, like the rabbis, only tried to protect God’s commandment by extending the prohibition to touching. Her mistake, however, was saying that God had actually issued such a command. She should have declared that while God forbade eating from the tree, she had decided not to touch it either as a “fence” around the law.
The message of this distinction is that while rabbinic law is central, it is important to understand with clarity which laws are rabbinic and which are biblical in nature.
It ought also be noted that, separate from rabbinic legislation and interpretation, is the idea of chumrah, the imposing of a more stringent observance of the law. While one has every right to be more stringent, and at times stringency elevates one’s spirituality, it is important to distinguish between chumrah and basic law in order to recognize that when chumrah becomes law, it blurs the halachah by redefining the line of the permissible and the prohibited.
Candle lighting:
Re’eh parsha
August 11 at 7:42 p.m.