Emor: A Misunderstood Rashbam about Mikra'ei Kodesh

Today’s daf yomi happens to align with the sidra of Emor, both in terms of a pasuk being cited, as well as Abaye’s interpretation of קָרָא עָלַי מוֹעֵד, so I’m posting this today.

In the sidra of Emor, in Vayikra 23:2, various holidays are called mikra’ei kodesh.

דַּבֵּ֞ר אֶל־בְּנֵ֤י יִשְׂרָאֵל֙ וְאָמַרְתָּ֣ אֲלֵהֶ֔ם מוֹעֲדֵ֣י ה אֲשֶׁר־תִּקְרְא֥וּ אֹתָ֖ם מִקְרָאֵ֣י קֹ֑דֶשׁ אֵ֥לֶּה הֵ֖ם מוֹעֲדָֽי׃

Speak to the Israelite people and say to them: These are My fixed times, the fixed times of יהוה, which you shall proclaim as sacred occasions.

Targum Onkelos renders this phrase as מְעָרְעֵי קַדִּישׁ. Thus:

מַלֵּיל עִם בְּנֵי יִשְׁרָאֵל וְתֵימַר לְהוֹן מוֹעֲדַיָּא דַיְיָ דִּי תְעָרְעוּן יָתְהוֹן מְעָרְעֵי קַדִּישׁ אִלֵּין אִנּוּן מוֹעֲדָי:

Speak to Bnei Yisroel and say to them; the appointed times of Adonoy, which you shall proclaim [cause] them [to occur] as holy assemblies [occurrences]; these are My appointed times.

and so too Targum Pseudo-Yonatan on Torah, but spelling the first word with an aleph in the first instance.

מַלֵיל עִם בְּנֵי יִשְרָאֵל וְתֵימַר לְהוֹן זְמַן סִדוּרֵי מוֹעֲדַיָא דַיְיָ דִתְאַרְעוּן יַתְהוֹן מְאַרְעֵי קַדִישׁ אִלֵין הִינוּן זְמַן סִדוּרֵי מוֹעֲדָי

Speak with the sons of Israel, and say to them, The orders of the time of the Festivals of the Lord, which you shall proclaim as holy convocations, these are the orders of the time of My festivals.

Now, mikra with an aleph usually conveys the idea of calling, and that’s an idea prevalent in Chazal, that the court effectively sets the dates of the festivals, by recognizing and proclaiming the new moon.

Thus, Rashi, citing the Sifra, says something like this, quoting the Sifra:

דבר אל בני ישראל, מועדי ה'. עֲשֵׂה מוֹעֲדוֹת שֶׁיִּהְיוּ יִשְֹרָאֵל מְלֻמָּדִין בָּהֶם, שֶׁמְּעַבְּרִים אֶת הַשָּׁנָה עַל גָּלֻיּוֹת שֶׁנֶּעֶקְרוּ מִמְּקוֹמָן לַעֲלוֹת לָרֶגֶל וַעֲדַיִן לֹא הִגִּיעוּ לִירוּשָׁלַיִם (ספרא):

'דבר אל בני ישראל, מועדי ה‎‎ SPEAK UNTO THE CHILDREN OF ISRAEL [AND DECLARE UNTO THEM] THE APPOINTED FESTIVALS OF THE LORD — This means, Regulate the festive seasons in such a manner that all Israel should become practised in them (their observance). Hence we derive the law that they (the Sanhedrin) proclaim a leap-year (i. e. intercalate a second Adar) for the sake of those living in the diaspora who have already left their homes in order to go up for the festival but have not yet arrived in Jerusalem (Sifra, Emor, Section 9 1; cf. Sanhedrin 11a).

Rashbam, his grandson, often deviates on the level of peshat. He knows that מקרה with a heh means a chance occurrence, and that the peshat-based Targumim on this verse support such a reading. Thus, Rashbam writes:

אשר תקראו אותם מקראי קדש - אשר תזמנו אותם זמני קדש. כל לשון קריאה שאצל מועדים לשון קביעת זמן הוא, כמו: קרא עלי מועד. וכן התרגום: מערעי קדיש. ולשון כמקרה הכסיל.

I don’t really know how to translate this, whether in the sense of deciding what time it should be, or perhaps better, taking this appointed time and establishing it in its role. But the actual times are already known and set by the verses. Here’s my stab at it:

אשר תקראו אותם מקראי קדש — which you shall appoint them [tazminu] to be holy times. All language of קריאה via moadim / festivals are a language of establishing a time, such as Eicha 1:15, קָרָ֥א עָלַ֛י מוֹעֵ֖ד {Josh: perhaps He has proclaimed a gathering / set time against me, see Rashi there}. And so the Targum {Onkelos and pseudo-Yonatan on this local verse in Vayikra}, מערעי קדיש. And it is a language like Kohelet 2:5, כְּמִקְרֵ֤ה הַכְּסִיל֙, “like the occurrences of the fool”.

About that verse in Eicha, looking at Rashi, he writes:

קָרָא עָלַי מוֹעֵד. יְעִידַת גְיָסוֹת לָבֹא עָלָי. וְרַבּוֹתֵינוּ דָרְשׁוּ מַה שֶׁדָּרְשׁוּ. תַּמּוּז דְּהַהִיא שַׁתָּא מְלוּיֵי מַלְיוּהָ, שֶׁל שָׁנָה שְׁנִיָּה לְצֵאתָם מִמִּצְרָיִם. לְכַךְ, אֵירַע חֲזָרָתָן שֶׁל מְרַגְּלִים לֵיל תִּשְׁעָה בְאָב, שֶׁעָלֶיהָ הֻקְבְּעָה בְכִיָּתָן לְדוֹרוֹת:

He has proclaimed a gathering against me. A gathering of troops to come against me. And our Rabbis expounded what they expounded. Tammuz of that year was a full month [=30 days], of the second year from their Exodus from Egypt. Therefore, the return of the spies occurred on the night of the ninth of Av, upon which their weeping was established for generations.

Assuming that וְרַבּוֹתֵינוּ דָרְשׁוּ מַה שֶׁדָּרְשׁוּ refers to what follows (which is slightly strange), Rashi is saying that peshat has to do with a gathering coming against him, but the midrash is that this has to do with fixing a time. Regardless, “proclaim” as קָרָא is off for our purposes.

(By the way, the commentary attributed to Rashbam on that verse reads: גם אני יקרני - שאמות כאחד מן הכסילים , ואיזה ריוח יש לי בחכמתי יותר ממנו? שגם זה הבל - ועל כן נאמר "מה יתרון לאדם" (קה' א , ג).)

Now, Eliyahu Munk also struggles with translating Rashbam on out verse, I think, but is influenced in part by other traditional readings and lack of digital availability of sources. He writes.

אשר תקראו אותם מקראי קודש, which you are to designate as periods of sanctified time. Whenever the word קרא appears in connection with the festivals it means the fixing of certain dates in the calendar. We have an example of this in Lamentation 1,15 where the prophet Jeremiah refers to the date on which the Temple was destroyed as קרא עלי מועד,”G’d having fixed the date the Jewish people was to experience this traumatic event including the killing of the flower of its youth.”

Yonathan ben Uzziel, in translating Kohelet 2,15 כמקרה הכסיל, normally translated as “like the fate of the fool,” renders these words as מערע קדיש, [my version of the Targum renders the meaning of the verse quite differently, in a fatalistic sense, i.e. that G’d decrees death regardless of whether one is a fool or as wise as Solomon. Ed.]

So, he takes designate, which is a fair reading of תזמנו. He expands the concise citation of Lamentation[s] 1:15 to include the idea of fixing the date of the traumatic event.

Where he goes slightly off the rails is in claiming that Yonatan ben Uziel translated Kohelet, which is part of Ketuvim. Megillah 3a asserts that he made the translation on Neviim and the earth shook, but when he sought to translate Ketuvim, he was forbidden from doing so.

וְעוֹד בִּיקֵּשׁ לְגַלּוֹת תַּרְגּוּם שֶׁל כְּתוּבִים, יָצְתָה בַּת קוֹל וְאָמְרָה לוֹ: דַּיֶּיךָּ! מַאי טַעְמָא — מִשּׁוּם דְּאִית בֵּיהּ קֵץ מָשִׁיחַ.

And Yonatan ben Uzziel also sought to reveal a translation of the Writings, but a Divine Voice emerged and said to him: It is enough for you that you translated the Prophets. The Gemara explains: What is the reason that he was denied permission to translate the Writings? Because it has in it a revelation of the end, when the Messiah will arrive. The end is foretold in a cryptic manner in the book of Daniel, and were the book of Daniel translated, the end would become manifestly revealed to all.

Indeed, Rashbam never mentions Targum Yonatan, just Targum. I would guess Eliyahu Munk just assumed it must be Targum Yonatan, since Onkelos doesn’t exist on Ketuvim.

Where he goes further off the rails, and entirely turned around, is claiming that כמקרה הכסיל is to be translated as מערע קדיש. He does not realize that the reference is to our own Targum Onkelos in the verse he is currently translating, for some reason. This might be why he writes [my version of the Targum renders the meaning of the verse quite differently, in a fatalistic sense, i.e. that G’d decrees death regardless of whether one is a fool or as wise as Solomon. Ed.].

Indeed, that is the basic gist of the pasuk. The the Targum available on Kohelet says something that isn’t exactly that, but perhaps one can read it back into the Targum:

וַאֲמָרִית אֲנָא בִּלְבָבִי כְּאִרְעוּן שָׁאוּל בַּר קִישׁ מַלְכָּא דִּסָט בְּסַטוּתֵיה וְלָא נְטַר תַּפְקִידְתָּא דְּאִתְפְּקַּד עַל עֲמָלֵק וְאִתְנְטָלַת מִנֵּיהּ מַלְכוּתָא אַף אֲנָא יְעַרְעִנַּנִי וְלָמָא דֵין חַכִּימִית אֲנָא בְּכֵין יַתִּיר מִנֵּיהּ וּמַלֵּילִית אֲנָא בְּלִבִּי דְּאַף דֵּין הַבָלוּ וְלֵית אֱלָהֵין גְּזֵירַת מֵימְרָא דַּיָי:

And I said in my heart, a destiny like that of Saul, the son of Kish, the king, who turned aside, and did not keep the commandment given to him about Amalek, and the kingdom was taken from him, will also befall me; and why then am I wiser than he? And I said in my heart, that also this is vanity, and there is nothing except the decree of the Lord.

Note my boldings. The point of citing that verse is that מקרה there with a heh is also translated as ארע or ערע, meaning an incident / occurrence.