Another Pirkei Avot Post

Why does Pirkei Avot start with the chain of tradition back to Moshe and G-d at Sinai?

The answer I've stuck with for years (of R Ovddia of Bartenura and others) is this:

The lesson is that these sayings about ethics and life are not just nice quotes. They are as much a part of Torah from Sinai as any other part of our tradition. (And I just realized that this is probably the inspiration meaning behind the title of my favorite work on Avot, "Ethics From Sinai."

I recently thought of another, related- but I think different, answer:

Perhaps we are reminded of the giving of the whole Torah, here, at the start of Avot for this reason:

To be a person who truly adheres to the Torah it is not peripheral but fundamental that one be a ba'al midot, an ethical mentsch. The directions of this tractate are the undercurrent that flows under all the other tractates. Avot is the subtext of every Toah text and the other texts and Avot all must be learned with this connection kept in mind.

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The saying - "be patient in judgment" may mean something other than the conventional explanation that you should be slow and thoughtful in judging others.

Maybe it also means that when you are experiencing a time of din, of judgment, of difficulty, be patient as you go through it.

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He'emidu talmidim harbei. This is generally traslated to mean to teach many students. The word used is not the normal word for teaching. The word used means ro cause to stand up. We are told here to influence our students to have a strong and straight spine, and to walk tall. We are to teach and to model Torah in such a way that it accompanies an appropriate sense of confidence.

The implicit message is that we ourselves are to stand upright and unafraid.

This is something I plan and pray to bring in to the classroom and the world tomorrow and everyday.

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The mishna in Avot says to stick to the dust of the feet of the rabbis (I have 3 possible meanings for this and would love to hear more) and then it advises us to drink their words with thirst. A student suggested that the image of drinking comes after the image of dust as a purposeful contrast. Studying can be dry, just the nature of it. And it's up to the student sometimes to make things ripe and fresh and wet!

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Rabbi Dr. Dovid Katz contends that every saying in Avot is about something specific.

He says that, “Who is a warrior? He who conquers his negative inclinations” is about Alexander The Great. He conquered the world and word has it that he died from a three day celebratory drinking binge.

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