Pesachim 8b-9a - Danger, danger!

But Rabbi Eleazar said: "Those sent [to perform] a religious duty do not suffer harm"! — Said Rav Ashi: "He may have lost a needle and come to look for it." ... "Where the injury is probable it is different"

In discussing searching holes for leaven, the gemara says that one is exempt because of danger. But surely those in the process of doing a mitzvah are protected by God's aegis, says Rabbi Eleazar. Surely someone actively engaged in doing God's will is safe from accidental injury!

This viewpoint seems rather naive, albeit appealing. We know that anyone can suffer harm, even in the process of doing the greatest of mitzvot. The gemara in Chullin 142a, for example, has a striking story of the origin of Elisha ben Avuya's heresy, when he sees a boy obeying his father's command to send away the mother bird before taking the eggs, that tragically falls to his death. Not only was this boy fulfilling two mitzvot, but these are two mitzvot that the torah promises long life for. Our naive sense that God looks after someone doing a mitzvah just does not cohere with the universe as we experience it.

But the gemara offers us two ways of holding this view, while trying to reconcile it with the messy world where even those doing mitzvot suffer. Rav Ashi suggests that no one can guarantee they are exclusively doing a mitzvah. Other motivations always creep into your mind, self-centred or even selfish thoughts may lie behind even the most important of mitzvot, leaving one vulnerable.

The Talmud later limits the principle still further, stating that when injury is likely, the principle doesn't apply at all.

It seems to me that the Talmud wants us to hold the principle as a serious one, as a motivator to take some risks for the sake of fulfilling mitzvot. Take risks, have faith in God! Chase after the mitzvot! But don't be stupid about it. The world is still a dangerous place, and there is still danger out there.

Danger, danger!

The rather peculiar story of Elijah struck me today, as he turns up to tell Rabbi Yossi that he shouldn't have gone in to a ruin to pray but should have stayed on the road and prayed an abbreviated amidah. We are then told that there are 3 reasons not to go into a ruin - falling masonry, suspicion that one might be meeting a woman there, and demons.

It seemed strange to me that Elijah comes to teach something so apparently mundane - there are no enormous revelations here - so I started thinking about a possible deeper understanding. I came to the idea that the three dangers listed might cover more than just entering a ruin - that these three dangers, representing the physical, spiritual and social dangers, run the gamut of what threatens us as people living in society.

With the Talmud's short discussion afterwards, we know that no single one of these categories cover all of human experience, but all three are separate and necessary to explain the things that threaten who we are. Physical, spiritual and social dangers may come at any time, but we might think that we are particularly vulnerable at night, when the world is dark, and we don't know what's out there.

So perhaps we've learnt something more than why we should be careful about entering a ruin - for the world is dark and full of terrors.