In explaining the Mishnah's admonition that "things before" should not be discussed, the gemara uses an analogy of a king who asks his servants to build him a palace on a dung heap. After they finish, the king no longer wants them to mention the dung heap. What's the analogy here? What is the dung heap? Is the cosmology here that the earth is built on a dung heap, like Washington D.C. is built on a swamp? If so, wouldn't that fall more into the maaseh bereshit category of concern? The challenge to this Mishnah from the stam seems to be more concerned about the past, not creation, "what happened, happened!" they say. Quite so. I'm not sure how the analogy solves this objection.
Color me confused.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
1 comment:
I think the analogy is saying that, the King made a mistake of building his palace on a dunghill. It became obvious to him after the palace was built, but one can never admit that the King was wrong and therefore we act as if there is no dunghill there.
The analogy is that we shouldn't look back and scruntinize the past because it was God's (the King's) doing. And by questioning it we are only asking for trouble.
Post a Comment