Synesthesia at Har Sinai (article preview)

Here is my Jewish Link article for this coming week, that is also aligned with the sidra. It is mostly behind a paywall here, but you can read it in full on the newspaper’s web site. Maybe a summary post next week.

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Rabbi Yehoshua ben Korcha states in a Mishnah (Sanhedrin 56a) that, during a trial for blaspheming, the witnesses are asked to use an appellation of God’s name as they repeat the culprit’s curse, so that they don’t utter the blasphemy themselves. However, during sentencing, the judges dismiss everyone from the court and then interrogate the eldest witness, having him repeat what he heard precisely. They react by tearing their clothing, with the tear never being stitched back. The other witnesses then confirm that they heard the culprit say exactly that phrase. This demonstrates how we sometimes need to balance accuracy with sensitivity. Where possible, the judges avoided hearing the blasphemous words. But, what if the blasphemer actually said “Yossi should strike Yossi”, because he was angry with Rabbi Yossi ben Chalafta? Facts and nuance can be lost in translation, deliberately or accidentally.

On my Scribal Error substack, I’ve been discussing Eliyahu Munk’s English translations of Biblical commentators, analyzing weekly examples on the sidra. Munk is a prolific translator – and has translated Chizkuni, Meshech Chochma, Or Hachaim, Kedushat Levi, Baal HaTurim, Rabbeinu Bachya, Shnei Luchot HaBrit, Radak, Rashbam, Seforno, Alshich, Shadal, and more. A few of these works are freely available on Sefaria’s website, aligned with the pesukim, but most are just in printed form. These translations only include the English, not the original Hebrew, so the reader isn’t able to compare the English translation with what these rabbinic commentators actually wrote.

All translation is commentary, but there are aspects of Eliyahu Munk’s approach that are concerning. It often isn’t a literal translation, but intends to convey the general gist of the statement, sometimes by adding and sometimes by deleting words or phrases. He’ll sometimes skip the overly grammatical analyses, saying that neither he nor his readers are grammarians (see his translation to Chizkuni on Shemot 15:2). Also, it seems as if he sometimes deliberately skips or modifies what the meforshim say, if he feels that they are expressing heresy. He justified this in a Jewish Press interview (Translating One Classic After Another – For 40 Years: An Interview with Eliyahu Munk, June 28, 2018), in the following exchange:

“Q: You have been criticized in the past for omitting material in your translations. How do you respond? A: It’s not only permitted, but in the Targum of Edut HaMizrach, certain aspects of Aharon’s participation in the eigel are not translated. So if portions in the Torah could be eliminated from the Targum, certainly I can eliminate some portions from a rabbi who lived a couple of thousand years later.”

A Famous Rashi

Let’s explore how this plays out in parashat Yitro. Shemot 20:15 describes the scene at Har Sinai. “And all the nation saw (רֹאִ֨ים) the sounds (הַקּוֹלֹ֜ת) and the flames / lightning (הַלַּפִּידִ֗ם) and the sound of the shofar, and the mountain smoking; and the nation saw it, fell back and stood at a distance.” How does one see sounds? The Mechilta of Rashbi explains: “Within the natural order, one cannot see sound. However, here ‘they saw the sounds and the flames’, meaning that just as they saw the flames, so did they see the sounds.”