— THE JEWISH ENCYCLOPEDIA
Allegrorical Interpretation
forwaixl mill ex|)oun<ls tlint which is not known, for iu grcalfst part such men explain liy means of symbols in the old fushioneil manner" ("QuikI omnis They certainly posses.seil many probus liber," .ii. such allegorical interpretations of Scripture in writing (see Philo, "Dc Vita Coutcmpliitiva," iii.). I.
To Ikase upon the alKive nttort the iiiferenro that Essene allefforlsin wiut dniwn fn>m Hellenic soun-es— iks Zeller ("PhlliK4i.)phie iter liriwlien," vol, ili, |>art 2, p. :JH:il ha.s done— l.s <Tnmeous: f^lnKly of
for no .Iexan(trinn would liuve spoken so dLspaniIlellenle ulli-norlsni as (o call It 'old-fiu!hlom'<l,"
whereas the .Mexandrians may well have deemed the Pak^llnlan
—
Allegorical Interpretation out of date
it
waiS too Judaic
for
them.
The
early
Haggadot of
few specimens of
the
H. .Jdliaiian b.
Early Tannaim.
Tannaim contain only
their Allegorical
ZakUai
live iillegoricul
Interpretation.
with interpretations, four is
cicililed
of which icfer to Biblical i)as,s}tgcs (Ex. XX. 10,2."); .xxxii. 1(!: Ijcv. iv, 22; see Tosef,, B. K. vii. 3), and it is lemarked that he
explained theScripturesasa paraboliccharm that
is.
{kt»i>er):
allegorically, in the stylo of the Syniliolists,
nnion 'tnn
(Bachcr,
"Ag. Tan." i. 33). This apyounger contemporary
l)Hes also to U. Johaiian's
Gamaliel
II.
(Sotah.
I'tn).
But the allegori/.crof
this
Eleazar of Modiiiu, an uncle, according to The Mekilta rabbinical tradition, of Bar Kokba. upon Ex. xvii. 8 contains a running allegorization. Thus: Ainalck's on.sct was directed against those who were weak in faith, wherefore Moses sent men without sin to their protection. "The top of the hill." where Moses took his stand, signifies the pious deeds of the patriarchs and matriarclis, who are considered as till' highest pinnacles of the human race. " Moses' hands became heavy " wliene'er Israel 's sins ]>eiiod is
Aaron and Ilur ])revented the effects of prayer. represented the merits of their progenitors Levi Jloses vanquished Amaiek by his and Judah. wherefore
written in verse 13, 'S?. the sword "; by the movith, prayer replaces the sword. Many such allegorical interpretations by R. Kleazar are contained in the Miilrashim (see Bacher. l.r. i. 211 it ser/.). Though .kiba is not quoted as the atitlior of so many allegorisms as Eleazar, he is known as the jirayers.
3-)ri, literally,
first
book Akiba and His mon. School.
it
is
"by the mouth of
tanna to allegorize an entire of the Bible, the Song of Solo-
This was undoubtedly an im-
iiortant factor in iiuelling the opposition to the canonization of this book
(Mishnah Yail.
iii.
- >).
Fiom
the scant remains of
this allegory only so much is evident, that he perceived in the Song of Solomon a representation of the relations between God and Israel, portraying in its passages the most conspicuous events in the hisAlongside of tory of the nation, past and to come. this typological interpretaticm of this book, the es-
sential features of which have been crystallized in Targum and .Midrash, there may have stood that mystical intcrpntation which, according to Origen
("Canticum Canticorum," hom. iv.), was held in such high esteem among the Palestinian Jews that ils study was forbidden to those not of mature years. Akiba's as.sorti(m (Mishnah, ^'•.)that the Song of Solomon is "of the holiest of the holy," sounds in itAkiba's favorite pupil, H. self somewhat mystical. Meir, added to his master's interpretation of the l)ook in the same spirit; thus upon cli. i. verse 12, he ex plains, " while the King sitleth at his table, the spike-
nard scndeth forth the smell thereof," as signifying that while the King of Kings was in heaven occupied in giving the Law to Moses, Israel fell into sin (Ex. xxxii.) with the golden cM. of which it is said, "These be thy gods, O Israel" (Cant. R., in loco).
406
From
the controversy that arose between Meir and b. Ilai conciTiiing this exposition, it is evident that there were other pupils of Akiba who accepted his typo-allegorical method of inlerpretalion. .>leir was in so far independent of contempomries that he .saw also the sinister events of Israel's history depicted in the book, while the genend undeislanding was that, being a love song between God and Israel, it could therefore' contain nothing in the way of reproach. Meir allegorized the earliest Bible histoiy as well his explanation of iiy nun3 "coats of skin" (Gen. iii. 21) as nunS "coats of light" (Gen. R. xx. 12) is interesiing; the .same idea played quite a part in the earlier Gnostic and Chiistian
Judah
mx
literature.
Concerning R. Judah, the editor of the Mishnah, the important statement is made that he interpreted the Book of Joli as an allegorical repJudab. the resentation of the sin and punishment Patriarch, of the generation of the ttooil (Gen, R. xxvi. 7). Many allegorisms are quoted in the names of hisdiseiph'S. Bar Kappara interprets Ja<-ob'sdieam (Gen. xxviii. 12) in the following manner: "A ladder set upon th<' earth," that is the Tenqile: "the top of it reaching to heaven," that is the pillar of smoke from the sacrifices; "the angels ascending and descending on it," thi'se are the priests who mount and descend the steps leading to the altar; "and behold the Lord stood above it," that refers to .mos, ix. 1. " I saw the I»rd standing upon theallar" (Gen. R. Ixviii. 12). Raband Samuel, Ihe founders of the academies in Babylonia, are also named as the authors of allegorisms which, how-
have nothing specifically Babylonian about them, but are quite in the spiiit of Palestinian ever,
interpretation. Vhile the Babylonian schools did very little for the Haggadah in general and for allegory in particular, in Palestine the golden age of Palestinian allegorisin dawned wln>n the Amoraim Amoraim. interjireted everything in the Bible in an allelegend, history, and law gorical manner. But it would be incorrect to attribute the vast allegorical material of Midrash and Talmud exclusively to the particular Amoraim named as their authors. In Ihe tradition of the Haggadah, the subject matter was everything. Ihe name of the author nothing: so that the sjime Haggadah is continually found quoted with dilTerent sponsoi-s "who applied the traditional interpretation to their own times. It is hardly to be suppo.seil that a new and sudden develojiment of the tendency toward Only allegorization took place at any one epoch. latei generations which had the older material before them compiled that of the various epochs*. The following illustrations are taken from different parts of Ihe Pentateuch: R. Simeon b. Lakish exjiiains the second verse of Gen. i. as follows: "The earth was without form," that means Babylon: "and void," that means Media: "and darkness," that means Greece (the Antiochian persecutions); "upon the face of the deep," that means the wicked empire (Rome); "And the spirit of God moved," that means the spirit of the Mes,siah; "upon the face of the waters." that is, when Israel shall be repentant; for water (compare Lam. ii. 19) symbolizes repentance (Gen. R. ii. 4). Again, the four rivers of Paradise represent the four great kingdoms of the world Pishon is Babylon, after Hab. i. 8 the land of Havilah which it
—
—
compasses being Israel that watcheth for (np'nin) the Lord (Ps. xlii. 6) and has the gold of the Law. Gihon Media, the home of Haman, the serpent-like crawler (pnj. Gen. iii. 14): Iliddekel is the Seleucid is
