Sukkah, Daf Nun Gimmel, Part 3

 

Introduction

The mishnah had taught that there were fifteen steps leading up to the Temple, to correspond to the fifteen Songs of Ascent (Shir Hamaalot) in the Book of Psalms. This section explains what these songs cause to ascend.

 

חמש עשרה מעלות.

אמר ליה רב חסדא לההוא מדרבנן דהוי קמסדר אגדתא קמיה, אמר ליה: שמיע לך הני חמש עשרה מעלות כנגד מי אמרם דוד? – אמר ליה, הכי אמר רבי יוחנן: בשעה שכרה דוד שיתין, קפא תהומא ובעי למשטפא עלמא, אמר דוד חמש עשרה מעלות והורידן.

 

Fifteen steps.

R. Hisda said to a certain rabbi who was arranging his aggadot before him.

Have you heard concerning these fifteen Songs of Ascent, what did David compose them to correspond to?

He said to him: Thus said R. Yohanan: When David dug the Pits the Deep (tehom) rose up and threatened to submerge the world. David recited the fifteen Songs of Ascent and caused it to subside."

 

IN this section, R. Yohanan explains what prompted King David, who according to tradition authored the Book of Psalms, to write these fifteen psalms. The answer is related to some of the material taught in this chapter and in the previous one. When David dug the Pits under the altar, he accidentally hit the point at which the "Deep" called the "tehom" in Hebrew, was connected to the earth. These deep, primordial, waters threated to surface and flood the world, as they did in the days of Noah. David composed these fifteen songs, and they somehow caused the waters to subside. The world was preserved.

Note that this myth is part of the constellation of stories related to the notion that the altar in the Temple is the navel of the world. It is at this point that the waters of the world threaten to come out and destroy the world.

 

אי הכי, חמש עשרה מעלות? יורדות מיבעי ליה!

אמר ליה: הואיל ואדכרתן (מלתא), הכי אתמר: בשעה שכרה דוד שיתין קפא תהומא ובעא למשטפא עלמא,

אמר דוד: מי איכא דידע אי שרי למכתב שם אחספא ונשדיה בתהומא ומנח? ליכא דקאמר ליה מידי.

אמר דוד: כל דידע למימר ואינו אומר – יחנק בגרונו.

נשא אחיתופל קל וחומר בעצמו: ומה לעשות שלום בין איש לאשתו, אמרה תורה: שמי שנכתב בקדושה ימחה על המים, לעשות שלום לכל העולם כולו – על אחת כמה וכמה.

אמר ליה: שרי. כתב שם אחספא, ושדי לתהומא, ונחית תהומא שיתסר אלפי גרמידי. כי חזי דנחית טובא, אמר: כמה דמידלי טפי מירטב עלמא. אמר חמש עשרה מעלות ואסקיה חמיסר אלפי גרמידי, ואוקמיה באלפי גרמידי.

 

But if so Songs of Ascent, it should be of Descent?

He said to him: Since you have reminded me, this is how it was stated: When David dug the Pits, the Deep arose and threatened to submerge the world.

David asked, "Is there anyone who knows whether it is permitted to inscribe the [Divine] Name upon a sherd, and cast it into the Deep so that it should subside?"

No one said a word.

David said, "Whoever knows the answer and does not speak, may he be suffocated".

Ahitophel adduced an a fortiori argument to himself: "If, for the purpose of establishing harmony between man and wife, the Torah said, Let My name that was written in sanctity be blotted out by the water,how much more so may it be done in order to establish peace in the world!"

He [Ahitophel] said to him, "It is permitted!"

[David] wrote the [Divine] Name upon a sherd, cast it into the Deep and it subsided sixteen thousand cubits.

When he saw that it had subsided to such a great extent, he said, "The nearer it is to the earth, the better the earth can be kept watered" and he uttered the fifteen Songs of Ascent and the Deep ascended fifteen thousand cubits and remained one thousand cubits [below the surface].

 

R. Hisda critiques R. Yohanan’s aggadah. If these songs caused the waters of the Deep to subside, then they should be dubbed "Songs of Descent" not "Ascent."

Therefore, he offers a different aggadic story. David dug the Pits, but then saw that he had opened up a conduit whereby the waters of the Deep might destroy the world. Somehow he knew that writing God’s name on a sherd and throwing it into the Pits would cause the water to subside. What he didn’t know was whether this is permitted. Ahitophel, Saul’s son’s adviser after Saul’s death, a figure portrayed as a wise man in both the Bible and in rabbinic tradition, notes that in the Sotah ritual God’s name is written on a scroll and then the writing is rubbed off into water. This ritual is meant to bring peace between a man and woman by eliminating his suspicion that she was an adulteress. If for such a purpose, God’s name may be erased, all the more so it may be erased to save the world.

David then wrote God’s name on the sherd, and the waters subsided. The problem was that they subsided too much. While people don’t want waters coming up from the ground and submerging them, they also don’t want the waters to go too deep. So to get the waters to come back up, he composed fifteen Songs of Ascent. Now the primordial water was about 1000 cubits from the surface. Still, pretty deep, about 500 meters. This will be noted below.

 

אמר עולא: שמע מינה, סומכא דארעא אלפי גרמידי.

והא חזינן דכרינן פורתא ונפקי מיא! – אמר רב משרשיא: ההוא מסולמא דפרת.

 

Ulla remarked: Learn from that: the thickness of the earth’s surface is one thousand cubits.

But don’t we see that we dig a little and the waters emerge?

R. Mesharsheya said: That is due to the high level [of the source] of the Euphrates.

 

Ulla learns some science from this aggadic legend. The crust of the earth is one thousand cubits thick. The problem with this theory is that one can easily see that one need not dig one thousand cubits to reach water. Water lies far closer to the surface. R. Mesharshya answers that the water we find close to the surface is not the primordial waters of the deep. It is the water that is due to the local river, the Euphrates. The waters of the Deep lie far down below the Earth’s surface.