{"id":64720,"date":"2019-10-24T00:12:24","date_gmt":"2019-10-23T21:12:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/?p=64720"},"modified":"2023-05-17T08:32:37","modified_gmt":"2023-05-17T05:32:37","slug":"the-absence-of-learning-as-a-precursor-to-exile","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/the-absence-of-learning-as-a-precursor-to-exile\/","title":{"rendered":"The Absence Of Learning As A Precursor To Exile"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"entry-content\"><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[281],"tags":[783,466,940],"acf":{"old_id":"64720","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":46656,"related_cahpter":"335","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content":{"description":"","content":"<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The book of Isaiah opens with a \u201cshape up or ship out\u201d prophecy in which Isaiah details steps that the Jewish people must take to save themselves from exile. Some of those steps seem predictable: \u201cpurify yourselves\u2026stop doing evil\u2026 (1:16)\u201d. But then comes a curious self-improvement requirement: \u201clearn to do good (1:17)\u201d. Not DO good but LEARN (<em>limdu<\/em>) to do good. This direction to not act reflexively but to invest some thought and scrutiny into one\u2019s actions is supported by the next verse in which Isaiah says \u201clet us reason together\u201d. Radak explains that God is asking them to engage in some critical analysis of their behaviour. Don\u2019t just act, really think about it first and learn what you should be doing and how to get there.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This exhortation hearkens back to the events of 2 Kings, chapter 22, when the Temple High Priest found Moses\u2019 Torah scroll in the temple. Our sages tell us that the scroll was open to the verses detailing the exile from Israel that had been decreed against the people should they decline to the spiritual level at which they apparently now sat. Me\u2019am Lo\u2019ez offers an explanation that at the time this scroll was found the written Torah had been forgotten and the oral tradition \u2013 the knowledge passed from parent to child &#8211; had also died out. Effectively then, learning had ceased. So how does one \u201clearn to do good\u201d in an environment devoid of learning. And what might exile to Babylonia serve to achieve?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Ironically it is in the Babylonian Talmud (Rosh HaShanah) that we learn \u201c<em>meshane makom, meshane mazal<\/em> \u2013 change your place and change your fortune.\u201d Similar to Abraham having to \u201cl<em>ech lecha<\/em>\u201d \u2013 go and leave his birthplace in order to realize his destiny, so too, perhaps, must the Jewish people of the First Temple era leave their environment in order to learn, or relearn, how to enact their destiny.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n","image":false,"embedded_video":"","video_duration":"","show_fb_comments":true,"credit_media":""},"tile":{"top_caption":"","main_caption":"The Absence Of Learning As A Precursor To Exile","main_caption_size":"1","sub_caption":"Similar to Abraham having to \u201clech lecha\u201d \u2013 go and leave his birthplace in order to realize his destiny, so too, perhaps, must the Jewish people of the First Temple era leave their environment in order to learn, or relearn, how to enact their destiny.\u00a0","preview_embedded":"","preview_image":false,"preview_video":"","external_link":"","link_for_pay":false,"tile_gallery_items":false,"credits":""},"alternate_tile":{"top_caption":"","main_caption":"","main_caption_size":"1","sub_caption":"","hide_media":false},"tile_group":{"preview_image_url":false,"main_caption":"","sub_caption":"","":null,"popup_package_extra_content":"","read_time":""},"home_color":"","home_gallery_top":"","home_gallery_middle":"","home_gallery_book":"","home_gallery_bottom":"","seo":{"seo_title":"","seo_description":"","seo_default_title":"","seo_default_description":""},"links":false,"send_noty":false},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64720"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=64720"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64720\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":114954,"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64720\/revisions\/114954"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=64720"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=64720"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=64720"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}