There are maybe half-a-dozen famous verses in the Pirke Avot, maybe not even so many. I mean, famous enough to be quoted out of context, famous enough to be familiar to people who haven’t read the thing, famous enough for people to say Oh, that’s where it’s from. Maybe not as many as half-a-dozen. Maybe only this one, Hillel’s third in his three verse triad. I’ll give it in the Hertz, because (I think) that’s the most often quoted version:
He used to say, If I am not for myself, who will be for me? And if I am only for myself, what am I? And if not now, when?
And because I like to give some sense of the rhythm and sound of the writing, here’s a transliteration of my own:
Huh ayah omer: im ayn ani li, mi li? Uch’she-ani l’atzmi, ma ani? V’im lo achshav, aymatai?
I am impressed, again, by the power of the verse, coming after a dozen triples of varying lengths and structures. Some have been specific (don’t lead witnesses) and some general (Torah good), with some there’s been a struggle to lift them out of their time and place and apply them here and now, and there have been some that I have pretty nearly rejected outright. Some of the triples have balanced nicely, some have shown a progression of one sort or another, and some have been clunkers, at least from my point of view. And now, this one. It kicks me out of the text, while I’m reading it, makes me repeat it, trying different inflections. It’s a tiny hall of mirrors of a verse. It’s also, by the way, in Hebrew again, after the Aramaic of the last verse. The Aramaic sounds (to my ears) clunky and foreign; the Hebrew is pretty and familiar. The words are common words, me, who, what, now, not. Oddly enough, I don’t recognize the word for when, nor can I bring to mind the Hebrew word for when. I must have learned it at some point, right? The Hebrew for horse is sus. I remember that. Don’t know why.
Anyway, I think I’ll do individual notes for the internal triple, perhaps a little different in content, as it’s a different kind of verse. There are two tracks of interpretations that are well trod. The verse for many people shows the balance between individual and collective action; for others it shows the necessity of spiritual humility, as your merit is necessary but insufficient, and your life is brief. I think those are both good interpretations, powerful interpretations, and reason enough to have the verse as calligraphy on your wall or slipped into your sig file. I’d enjoy a conversation about either or both of those interpretations, so I’ll leave this note here for that and go on to a new note for the other stuff.
Tolerabimus quod tolerare debemus,
-Vardibidian.