The Nature of “The” Rakia

PREFATORY REMARKS 

On his blog, “Rationalistic Judaism,” Rabbi Natan Slifkin’s expressed desire is to convince us that Chazal universally held, as a mesorah (a teaching revealed through prophecy, especially that of Moshe Rabbeynu’s), that “the” rakia is a solid dome over the earth. He uses that false foundation to allow his argument that since this alleged mesorah has been proven erroneous, we must concede that not every mesorah is necessarily true. Citing the Rambam and many others as lending legitimacy to such an approach, he concludes that he too is therefore free, indeed forced, to declare erroneous as well Chazal’s mesorah that the Creation process defied natural mechanisms (and he thereby declares himself free to follow the current thought that the universe, earth and life developed through allegedly natural—albeit divinely guided—mechanisms of evolution). He thereby creates a radical overhaul of the concept of what the force of mesorah is, contradicting the concept as it has been understood for millennia by all classical authorities: 

Chazal (and most of the Rishonim) universally interpreted various words in the Torah to be describing the heavens as a solid firmament above us. And yet, nobody today believes that such a structure exists. … [T]his means that the mesorah was reinterpreted in light on modern science. Hence, we can do the same with regard to the mesorah about the nature of creation.”

(Rabbi Natan Slifkin, Rationalist Judaism blog, Thursday, January 6, 2011, “The Big Picture of the Firmament”). 

In fact, Rabbi Slifkin admits that he is claiming that the rishonim did not merely reinterpret, but actually rejected the mesorah: 

The Big Picture of the Firmament (Thursday, January 6, 2011) yakov r said... this view of the sky (rakia) found in the Gemara is Chazal's view of the firmament as described in Tenach. And in a subsequent post, I pointed out that this means that the mesorah was reinterpreted … When you say reinterpret, do you mean simply dismissed? [1] January 6, 2011 3:32 PM  Natan Slifkin said... Yes, you are correct, I meant to say that the TORAH was reinterpreted. The mesorah was rejected. January 6, 2011 3:35 PM

Not Part of the Mesorah

It has been pointed out before. Rabbi Slifkin fails to recognize a fundamental distinction. The Rambam—joined by the other authorities upon whose license Rabbi Slifkin relies[2]—explicitly denies that Chazal’s statements about the celestial rakia’s substance are part of the mesorah,[3]—in marked contrast to what is a matter of mesorah: [4] the description of Creation as a meta-natural process, utilizing mechanisms that ceased regular function upon the arrival of the first Shabbos.[5] 

The Tanna Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai provides evidence for the Rambam’s position that statements by Chazal explaining what makes the stars move as they do, and the very necessity to postulate the existence of spheres responsible for such, were speculative and not received through the mesorah:

אמר רבי שמעון בן יוחאי אין אנו יודעין אם פורחין הן באויר, ואם שפין ברקיע ואם מהלכין הן כדרכן, הדבר קשה מאד, ואי אפשר לבריות לעמוד עליו.

 

Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai said, We do not know if they fly in the air, if they  glide in the rakia,, or if they go their way on their own [self-propelled—ZL]; the matter is exceedingly difficult and it is impossible for humans to determine. [6]

 

The Radak (Breishis 1:1) too, tells us that the Torah teaches us details only about the creation of things that were to be located below the moon—nothing about the universe beyond that point. The Light and the celestial bodies, he says, are mentioned only insofar as the role they play in what they provide for the Earth.

ולא נזכר בסדר ימי בראשית אלא מגלגל הירח ולמטה, והאור והמאורות לא נזכרו אלא לענין להאיר על הארץ ... וכן כתב החכם רבי אברהם בן עזרא ז"ל כי לא דבר משה רבינו ע"ה רק על העולם ההויוה וההפסד, והשמים הם הרקיע הנברא ביום שני.[7]

 

Only that which is below the moon’s sphere is mentioned in the Torah’s account of Creation. The Light and the celestial bodies are only mentioned for their role in providing light on the earth. …The chacham Rabbi Avraham Ibn Ezra also wrote that Moshe Rabbeynu spoke only about the temporal world; and [when the Torah says Hashem created the Heavens and the Earth,] the “Heavens” refer to the rakia (sky) created the second day [ not to the spiritual Heavens, nor the heavens containing the stars, sun and moon].

 

So, for his license to differ with some statements of Chazal, Rabbi Slifkin invokes the Rambam et al, but ignores the limits they place. Whereas all bearers of Torah tradition maintain and strive to defend the axiom that something is either (a) a mesorah and true, or (b) not a mesorah and not necessarily true, Rabbi Slifkin illegitimately claims to be within bounds when he declares that something could be a mesorah yet not true. No representation of Judaism that rejects the mesorah can be considered legitimate.

Weak Evidence That Chazal Universally Believed the Rakia is Solid

But let us put aside the fact that there was no mesorah that the earth is covered by any kind of a solid dome (opaque or otherwise). Was this even something that Chazal universally thought was so? Rabbi Slifkin’s “proofs” that it was…are extremely wanting:

1. He claims, “Since in the ancient world everyone believed that the sky is solid, there is no question that when each of the Sages received their Torah education from their parents and teachers, they were taught that the rakia is a solid firmament - as were their parents and teachers in turn.” Besides his unfounded assumption that the sages failed to distinguish, for themselves and for their disciples, between what they actually received as mesorah and what they speculated about it, his premise about the beliefs of the ancient world is tenuous, if not false.[8]

2. In another venue, he attempted this “proof”: “What do you think the spheres are made of? They are certainly solid, as the stars and planets are embedded within them!” (Natan Slifkin on September 7, 2010 at 2:50 pm Hirhurim blog, “Rabbis And Traveling to the Moon” comment section). Rabbi Slifkin fails to note that the Rambam, while maintaining that the stars are embedded in the spheres, also characterizes the spheres as weightless, colorless, and so ethereal as to remain unimpressionable by physical entities:

אינם כמו החומר הזה אשר בנו, ולפיכך אין אנו יכולים לתארם אלא בשמות בלתי מוגדרים לא בחיוב המוגדר. שאנו אומרים כי השמים לא קלים ולא כבדים ולא מתפעלים, ולפיכך אינם מקבלים רשמים, ואינם בעלי טעם ולא בעלי ריח וכיוצא בשלילות אלו, כל זה בגלל אי ידיעתנו אותו החומר.

…they are not made of the same matter that is with us, and we are therefore only able to describe them in terms negating the properties they lack. Thus, we say that the heavens are neither light nor heavy; they are not subject to outside influences, and therefore are not subject to impressions; and that they do not possess the sensations of taste and smell, and similar negations of attributes. All this us due to our lack of knowing that substance. (Guide For the Perplexed, 2:48)

So, it does not at all follow that “They are certainly solid, as the stars and planets are embedded within them!”

Evidently, Rabbi Slifkin reasons that massive, heavy bodies such as stars can only be contained by a body if that body is a very hard solid. This is poor evidence, because (a) the “Chachmei Yisrael” argued that the stars were not embedded within the spheres, but simply glided along them; and (b) more importantly, as stated in my reply loc. cit, it is more likely that Chazal held, as the rishonim did, that the spheres were ethereal, so their grip on the (less ethereal) stars was not thought to be that of a simple corporeal solid material.

3. He cites the Gemora Pesachim 94a, dealing with the path of the sun, which I shall treat later.

4. His main focus is Chazal’s treatment of a verse in Iyov. This shall be the main focus of this paper as well.

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[1] There comes a point where a concept can no longer be considered an interpretation of something, but an alternative to it. The assertion that the world has eternally existed, for example, is not a “reinterpretation” of the mesorah that it was first created a finite number of years ago. Similarly, in both contrasts at issue here—(a) non-solid vs. solid rakia, and (b) the mesorah of a meta-natural development of the world and its inhabitants vs. an allegedly natural development—the latter assertion is not a reinterpretation of the former, but an opposing view. 

[2] See the survey in the “Rationalist’s” monograph, “The Sun’s Path at Night.

[3]

ואמנם כל מה שבשמים לא ידע האדם דבר ממנו אלא בזה השעור הלמודי המעט, ואתה תראה מה שבו. ואני אומר ע״צ מליצת השיר, "השמים שמים לה׳ והארץ נתן לבני אדם," ר״ל שהשם לבדו ידע אמתת השמים וטבעם, ועצמם, וצורתם, ותנועותם, וסבותם על השלמות, אמנם מה שתחת השמים נתן יכולת לאדם לדעתו, מפני שהוא עולמו וביתו אשר ירד בו והוא חלק ממנו וזהו האמת, כי סבות הראיה על השמים נמנעות אצלנו, כבר רחקו ממנו ונעלו במקום ובמעלה. והראיה הכוללת מהם שהם הורונו על מניעם, אבל שאר ענינם הוא ענין לא יניעו שכלי האדם לידיעתו, והטריח המחשבות במה שלא יניעו להשגתו ואין כלי להם שיגיעו בו, אמנם הוא חסמן דעת או מין מהשגעון, אבל נעמוד אצל היכלת ונניח הענין כמה שלא יושג בהקש, למי שבאהו השפע האלהי העצום עד שיהיה ראוי שנאמר עליו פה אל פה אדבר בו, זה תכלית מה שאצלי בזאת השאלה, ואפשר שיהיה אצל זולתי מופת יתבאר לו בו אמתת מה שסופק אצלי, ותכלית בחירתי לאמת שאני בארתי בלבולי אלו הענינים, ואני לא שמעתי מופת על דבר מהם ולא ידעתיו

MN 2:24

What I said before (2:22) I will repeat now, namely, that the theory of Aristotle, in explaining the phenomena in the sublunary world, is in accordance with logical inference. Here we know the causal relationship between one phenomenon and another; we see how far science can investigate them, and the management of nature is clear and intelligible.

But of the things in the heavens man knows nothing except a few mathematical calculations, and you see how far these go. I say in the words of the poet," The heavens are the Lord's, but the earth He hath given to the sons of man" (Ps. cxv. 16): that is to say, God alone has a perfect and true knowledge of the heavens, their nature, their essence, their form, their motions, and their causes; but He gave man power to know the things which are under the heavens: here is man's world, here is his home, into which he has been placed, and of which he is himself a portion. This is in reality the truth. For the facts which we require in proving [anything about] the existence of heavenly entities are withheld from us: the heavens are too far from us, and too exalted in place and rank. Man's faculties are too deficient to comprehend even the general proof the heavens contain for the existence of Him who sets them in motion.

מורה נבוכים, ג:י”ד

MN 3:14

Now, do not ask it of me to conform everything our Sages say respecting astronomical matters to the situation as it is. For mathematics were lacking in those days, and their statements on those matters were not based on a mesorah from the Prophets, but on the knowledge which they either themselves possessed or derived from contemporary men of science. But we should not on that account say, about those things that do conform to the truth, that they are incorrect, or only conform coincidentally. Rather, it is preferable and proper for every educated and honest man to explain a person’s words in such a manner that they agree with fully established facts.

[4] Moreh Nevuchim 2:17: “For we, the community following in the footsteps of Moshe Rabbeynu and Avraham Avinu, aleihem hashalom, believe that the world came into being in such-and-such a form, and became such-and-such from such-and-such (haya kach mi-kach), and such was created after such.”

What specific, existing Jewish belief of things coming onto being (in full form—as the Rambam explains in Moreh Nevuchim 2:30, where he also says that all was created simultaneously, and then, one-by-one "set apart") should we suppose he was referring to, when writing of things becoming "such-and-such from such-and-such"? It is clear that he meant that part of the belief the Jewish community received from Moshe Rabbeynu is the meta-natural formation of, say, Adam from the adamah, and not from the beheima. 

[5] The “Rationalist” is aware of the distinction, but finds it “funny” for us to follow it: “As for quoting Rambam that there was no mesorah on astronomical matters - first of all, the idea of my opponents taking Rambam as the final word on mesorah is quite funny. Rambam, who claims that the mesorah of Judaism is largely identical to Greco-Muslim philosophy?!” (Sunday, November 28, 2010 Rationalist Judaism The Firming and Flattening of the Firmament). 

On the contrary. The claim that the Rambam largely identifies the mesorah as identical to Greco-Muslim philosophy only strengthens the veracity of his teaching that—despite his attributing the Greek view of the spheres to Chazal—the mechanics and nature of the celestial bodies (taken in a literal, physical sense) were a matter of speculation and not mesorah. 

And absolutely no reading of the Rambam, or any of the others who license disagreement with Chazal in some situations, excuses disagreement with the correct interpretation of Chazal reporting a mesorah. 

The inconsistency is actually the other way around. It is from the Rambam, and those who agree with him, that the “Rationalist” claims license to differ with Chazal. (His major monograph devotes much space to listing these authorities who allegedly give him this license.) Yet he dismisses their essential distinction. See also my essay, “How The Days of Creation Were Understood By Our Sages” 

The “Rationalist” goes on to make a distinction which my citation shows is simply untrue:  

“In any case, Rambam's statement is with regard to astronomical matters that Chazal had to figure out in order to create and apply halachos, not with regard to cosmology - the basic structure of the world and the meaning of basic words and concepts in the Torah.”) 

See next paragraph for rishonim who disagree with the “Rationalist’s” whim that Chazal’s must have considered as part of the mesorah their statements “about cosmology, the basic structure of the world and the meaning of basic words and concepts in the Torah, such as rakia.” 

[6] If the stars do indeed “fly in the air,” or are “self-propelled,” rather than moved by or along spheres, there is no point in the existence of a rakia which the philosophers postulated as a mechanism for the sun’s, moon’s and stars’ movements. Such a rakia would be an empty, purposeless entity. Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai’s proposition renders talk about the sphere’s solidity or opacity irrelevant, because there is no physical celestial sphere to speak of. And he explicitly identifies the determination of what makes the stars move as a matter of human speculation, not mesorah. 

[7] I thank Rabbi Dovid Kornreich for pointing this out.

[8] Wikipedia, “Celestial Spheres”: “Through an extensive examination of a wide range of scholastic texts, Edward Grant has demonstrated that scholastic philosophers generally considered the celestial spheres to be solid in the sense of three-dimensional or continuous, but most did not consider them solid in the sense of hard. The consensus was that the celestial spheres were made of some kind of continuous fluid” (Grant, Planets, Stars, and Orbs, pp. 328–30). The very person the “Rationalist” names the expert on ancient cosmology contradicts his claim that “in the ancient world everyone believed that the sky is solid” in the sense of hard, rather than a fluid, or vaporous substance. See also my essay, “A Not-So-Solid Proof About The Spheres.”