Last bit of this verse. Next week is a famous one, by the way, so begin the anticipation now.
He used to say: A name made great is a name destroyed; he that does not increase shall cease; he that does not learn deserves to die; and he that puts the crown to his own use shall perish.
There are two strands of commentary. There's the most common rabbinic interpretation that says that the crown, taga, is the crown of Torah, and therefore Hillel is warning against using learning in the Torah for self-aggrandizement. This puts the entire verse in the context of the sages who were the first audience of the book, and discusses humility and arrogance in the context of Torah study. And it does make sense; a learned rabbi can be very powerful, can attract to himself sycophants and toadies just as a secular politician can, can bring suits and win them by superior manipulation of the legal code rather than by justice. Of course, it's scarcely applicable to me; I could not put the crown of Torah to my use if I wanted to, my own crown of knowledge being scarcely a diadem, more of a tiara or a wreath, or actually just a scarf thrown hastily over the balding head of ignorance.
The other way to go is to take taga as actually toga, that he who dons the toga, that is, assimilates in order to further himself and his ambitions, shall perish. I wouldn't be surprised if that were Hillel's observation, that ambitious Jews who sucked up to the Romans didn't live long. The problem here is that again, it doesn't seem to say much to me. My own wardrobe is fully assimilated, at least in the sense that there is nothing in it that marks me as particularly Jewish, nor is there any garment I chose because it was particularly helpful in assimilating. Nor do I assimilate out of ambition; I am philosophically inclined to it, in its best sense.
So where does that leave us? In what way do we put the crown, or the toga, for that matter, to our own use, that Hillel is warning us against? Any thoughts, Gentle Readers?
Tolerabimus quod tolerare debemus,
-Vardibidian.