Rabbi Shimon ben (son of) Gamliel said: On three things does the world endure: justice, truth and peace, as the verse states, 'Truth and [judgments of] peace judge in your gates'" (Zechariah 8:16).
This mishna is similar to an earlier mishna in this chapter. In the second mishna, Shimon Hatsadik said: "The world is based upon three things: on Torah, on Temple Service, and on acts of kindness."
A recurring theme in our commentary has been that the first chapter is a chronicle of the Rabbis' attempt to find a political basis for the new Jewish state of the second Temple period. There was no King and the Hasmonean dynasty of princes quickly deteriorated spiritually and morally and could not serve as the model for an ideal commonwealth. As we have seen, the Sages considered various alternative models, most centering on autonomous groups within the imperfect Jewish polity. After Shimon Hatsaddik, who beleived that the world, read the State, could be based on Torah study, Temple service and instituionalized benevolence (what we now would call a wefare state), the subsequent generations, living as they did in a corrupt and increasingly Romanized vassal state, sought a different method of self organization. After a long period of discussion and trial of different structures, which taeks up the majority of this chapter, the consensus which they reached is expresssed in our mishna. It is a coda to the entire process and it restates the the mishna of Shimon Hatsaddik.
From Shimon to Shimon...
R. Shimon ben Gamliel restates the mishna of Shimon Hatsaddik. In this fashion he indicates to us that the original goals of Shimon Hatsaddik can still be obtained but now require a different framework.
Shimon Hatsaddik used the term "omed", meaning "stand". Shimon ben Gamliel uses the word "kayem", which means "persist". The word omed has a double meaning in Bblical Hebrew. It means both "stand" and "persist", as it does, for example in this verse in Tehillim 24: "
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מִי-יַעֲלֶה בְהַר-יְהוָה; וּמִי-יָקוּם, בִּמְקוֹם קָדְשׁוֹWho shall ascend into the mountain of the LORD? and who shall stand in His holy place? Yet, the word "persist" (or as it sometimes is translated, "endure"), has a much less optimistic ring to it. It speaks of retaining, of holding one's place, not of making gains or conquering new vistas. R. Shimon ben Gamliel writing after the destruction of the Beis Hamikdash, with the full knowledge of how things have gone wrong, no longer aspires to set the world up on the foundations of Torah. Avodah and benevolence; he aims to keep the Jewish community as it is and preserve and maintain. The "world" of R. Shimon ben Gamlel is not the same world as the one of Shimon Hatsaddik. The former speaks of community, a self-orgnizing collection of individuals. The latter was dreaming of a just polity, but R. Shimon ben Gamliel knows that it is no longer possible. Torah and Avodah will henceforth be the province of individuals. The community must be based on justice, truth and peace. The source verse of Zechariah is directed to those in "your gates", the common people, the folk, and it tells them how to conduct their daily life. WIth this, the first chapter of Avos concludes. The focus now shifts to the individual. In the second chapter, we will speak about the path that each man must choose in life, as a person, not as a member of a collective. Rabbi [Yehuda haNasi] said: What is the proper path a person should choose for himself? Whatever brings glory to himself [before G-d], and grants him glory before others.....
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