In the first century,* Aelius Theon defines the fable as “a fictitious story picturing truth … and afterward we add the meaning of which it is a picture” (Theon, Prog. 4).1 This definition is the starting point for a number of fable specialists today.2 In modern terms, fables are brief, past-tense fictional narratives describing the actions of characters, told for the purpose of making a point external to the storyworld that is normally explicated by an epimythium.3 Until quite recently, classical scholars took little interest in the ancient fable, while scholars of the parables of Jesus and rabbinic meshalim have had still less exposure to the ancient fable tradition or the scholarship on it.4 This is beginning to change and, in light of the ancient fable, is resulting in a new perspective on what have been traditionally called “parables.”5 Here and elsewhere I argue that the fable is the operative background for “narrative parables” and that the attempts to distinguish parables from fables have their origin in centuries-old theological motivations and the general unfamiliarity of biblical and rabbinic scholars with the ancient fable tradition. In this brief chapter, I address a few facets of this growing recognition with relevance for rabbinic literature. I question the appropriateness of using the term “parable” for rabbinic meshalim. I suggest that “fable” is the appropriate term for meshalim in the rabbinic context. I identify the use of the fable by the elite for rhetoric and education as backgrounds for the rabbinic mashal. Apart from elite discourses, I then identify a facet of the rabbinic mashal that comes to light when one is familiar with the use of fable in popular folk discourses: the literary persona of the fable teller, which is shared with Aesop and certain rabbinic figures famed for telling meshalim, such as Bar Kappara.
1 A (Re)New(ed) Perspective on “Parables”
When it comes to “parables” and rabbinic meshalim, there are four components to a terminological quagmire: the mysterious origin of the parable, the application of the term mashal to both “parables” and “fables,” the English word “parable” itself, and, finally, the difference between a “parable” and a “fable.” To clear the air, I need to introduce why I believe these are problems and then offer the solution. Let us take these issues one at a time. In the biblical world, the term mashal has a broad meaning, encapsulating texts that most modern scholars would label with numerous more specific terms such as proverbs, maxims, riddles, allegories, taunts, and so on.6 Granting this, as David Stern notes, in the Hebrew Bible, mashal “never, curiously enough, [refers] to the specific narrative forms that we call parables or fables. Only in rabbinic literature does the word mashal become a formal generic title for parables and fables.”7 In rabbinic literature, it has both dropped the breadth of meaning from the Hebrew Bible and has become a genre label specifically for “parables” and “fables.” Parable scholars occasionally comment on this curious fact, such as Bernard Brandon Scott, who writes: “Jesus and the rabbis developed and employed a genre of mashal not evidenced in the Hebrew Bible.”8
Once the word mashal (Aramaic mathla) crystallized as a formal genre title in rabbinic literature, the second point to observe is that it covers not one but apparently two literary genres: “parables” and “fables.” Put another way, rabbinic literature and the Hebrew language do not offer us separate terms by which to distinguish “parables” and “fables,” rather mashal covers them both. It is one thing for there to be multiple overlapping terms for related concepts, but here we have just one term available. A “parable” of a rabbi is called a mashal and a “fable” of Aesop, for example, is also a mashal. Referring to these texts as two genres thus does not emerge from within rabbinic literature or the Hebrew language, but rather from modern convention.
The third issue is with the English term “parable” itself. If the Synoptic Gospels were never written, it never would have occurred to anyone that mashal in rabbinic literature should be rendered into English using this word “parable.” This basic fact needs to be digested. Indeed, without the Synoptic Gospels, the word “parable” never would have entered the English lexicon. The English term “parable” does not come from rabbinic literature nor does it derive from the Septuagint;
For most of history, “parables” were not critically defined, rather distinguished from other texts merely by their association with Jesus, their presence in the corpus of the Synoptic Gospels, and the theological messages that were read into them. “Parable” originates as a term inextricably linked to the theological claims by Christians about Jesus of Nazareth and the uniqueness of his teaching. It has been the task of modern critical biblical scholars who have inherited the term “parable” to translate the ecclesiastic concept into a legitimate literary category, a genre, and to locate a historical setting for it. From this background alone, it is problematic to extrapolate this concept of “parable” to other texts, especially to translate mashal as “parable” in rabbinic literature.11 Classical scholars, for example, do not translate the term
One reason that “parable” seems to have stuck is because there has not been any apparent alternative. No one in the last century has been able to locate, in the whole of ancient literature, another
That there are not two terms for “parables” and “fables” should have been a clue, but the final piece of the puzzle has been growing recognition that traditional distinctions between “parables” and “fables” leak like a sieve. As Eli Yassif writes, “The distinction between fable (narrative mashal) and parable in rabbinic literature, for all its fundamental importance, is not unequivocal, and it is sometimes difficult to tell the two forms apart.”14 What Yassif has in mind for fundamental importance, he does not say, but among supposed divisions that one encounters are that parables are Semitic while fables are Hellenistic, that parables are realistic while fables are unrealistic, that parables teach theological lessons while fables teach mundane lessons, that parables are for adults while fables are for children, that parables are context dependent while fables are context independent, that parables are austere while fables are vulgar, that parables are for exegesis or particular points while fables are for general lessons, that parables are about humans while fables are about talking animals. None of these generalizations hold any water. In other words, there is no legitimate distinction between a “parable” and a “fable.”15
It is appropriate to describe this perspective not simply as a growing recognition, but as a re-emerging one. Foundational figures of critical biblical scholarship such as Adolf Jülicher, for example, wrote plainly: “The majority of Jesus’s
A fable of treasure in a field and a father teaching his sons:
A farmer who was about to die wanted his sons to be knowledgeable about the farm, so he summoned them and said, “My children, there is a treasure buried in one of my vineyards.” After he died, his sons took plows and mattocks and dug up the entire farm. They did not find any treasure, but the vineyard paid them back with a greatly increased harvest.
Thus they learned that man’s greatest treasure consists in work.
Perry 42; Chambry 83 [trans. Gibbs]19
A fable about a farmer:
A lion got into a farmer’s yard, and the farmer, wishing to catch him, shut the yard gate. At first, when he couldn’t get out, the lion killed the sheep, and then he turned to the cattle. The farmer began to worry about himself and opened the gate. After the lion was gone, the man’s wife found him groaning and said, “You got just what you deserved. Why did you want to shut in an animal you ought to have feared even at a distance?”
So it is that men who annoy those more powerful than themselves pay the penalty for their bad judgment.
(Perry 144; Chambry 197 [trans. Daly])20
A fable teaching lessons about impiety and the watchful eye of God:
Two boys were buying meat together. When the butcher turned around, one of them quickly picked up a pig’s foot and stuffed it in the other’s shirt. The butcher turned again and looked around for it. He accused the boys, but the one who had taken it swore he didn’t have it, and the one who had it swore he hadn’t taken it. The butcher saw through their trick and said, “You may deceive me with your lies, but you won’t deceive the gods.”
The fable shows that perjury is still a sin, even if it is cleverly done.
Perry 66; Chambry 246 [trans. Daly]21
The fable shows that even if lies escape the notice of people, they will not escape notice of God. (The moral to this fable in another manuscript).22
I hope that this amuse-bouche of fables suffices to demonstrate the point and piques the interest of readers interested in following where it leads.
This new perspective on “parables” brings the solution to the aforementioned conundrums. The fable explains where the new genre of rabbinic mashal came from, why rabbinic literature does not use two terms for “parables” and “fables,” why “parables” and “fables” are given the same definitions by their respective guild of scholars, and so on. From my perspective, it removes the need to deal with the word “parable” altogether. There is no need to split mashal into “parables” and “fables” because an ancient audience would recognize them all as fables. In Greek literature,
The implications of this perspective are many and far reaching. Previous studies on rabbinic fables have essentially inherited the Christian legacy of dividing “parables” from “fables,” stymieing the discussion until now. If “parables” and “fables” are the same, and the “parable” has a rather flimsy legitimacy as a genre, derived merely from the Synoptic Gospels, should we not simply jettison the term “parable” completely? Equating the rabbinic mashal with the fable moves us beyond a status quaestionis built on the assumption that “parable” material is unique and unparalleled, whether just to Jesus or Judaism more broadly. Equating the mashal with the fable situates these texts among one of the most ubiquitous genres in the ancient world. The ancient fable tradition is both incredibly ancient and rich. We have many hundreds of fables surviving from the days of Jesus and the rabbis, dozens of narratives depicting characters telling fables, numerous topoi associated with the fable tradition, stereotypical characterizations of fable tellers, abundant ancient theoretical discussions of the genre, and so on.
2 Rhetoric, Exegesis, and Education Using the Mashal/Fable
Once one recognizes the long-neglected fable genre as the operative literary context for the rabbinic mashal, many new doors open for comparing rabbinic meshalim to the numerous fable contexts. Aesop represents one end of the fable’s genre associations—the genre of the low, associated with slaves and the popular class—while the fable also has a long pedigree in elite discourses. Before the fable began to be recognized for its literary merits, the genre is best attested embedded within Greek writings where it is used for scoring points in rhetorical exchanges and legal disputations. The predominant function of meshalim embedded in rabbinic texts appears to be similar if not identical to this—winning rhetorical disputes and forensic exegesis. When one only compares the rabbinic meshalim to “parables” of Jesus and texts labelled mashal in the Hebrew Bible, it appears that this use of mashal is something peculiar to rabbinic Judaism. Bringing in the broader fable context suggests however that using the mashal, “fable,” as a tool to interpret and argue about legal minutia was commonplace and would have been a natural extension of the genre into rabbinic Judaism. While there have been recent studies comparing rabbinic methods and categories with their Greek rhetorical equivalents,27 the misidentification with and limitation of the rabbinic mashal to
The use of the fable in education extends back to the examples from the Old Babylonian period. It is established in the Greek tradition by the time of Socrates (Resp. 2.376e–377a) and played a part of education in the Roman Period from primary education through advanced training in constructing rhetorical arguments.28 How might this well-established tradition of learning with the fable relate to Jewish education with meshalim in the Roman period? According to the Talmud, Rabbi Meir (fl. second century CE), for example, “would teach a third halakha, a third agaddah, and a third mashal.” And Rabbi Yohanan says, “There were three hundred meshalim of foxes attributed to Rabbi Meir, but we have none except three” (b. Sanh. 38b–39a).29 Yohanan ben Zakkai (ca. 30–90 CE), the earliest named individual to whom a mashal is attributed in the rabbinic corpus, was likewise concerned with the study of “fables of fullers (
3 The Life of Aesop and the Rabbinic Fable Teller: Tabbai and Bar Kappara
The constraints of space permit a brief examination of just one further unexplored facet of the ancient fable tradition that had an apparent influence upon rabbinic literature. This is the parallel between the literary persona of the fable teller and the characterization of certain rabbinic figures. From previous studies on fables in the rabbinic corpus, it is clear that rabbinic authors were well acquainted with their use.32 Few have sought comparisons with the traditions of Aesop specifically or been concerned with more than establishing parallels between a particular mashal and a particular fable attested outside of rabbinic literature. Once again, this is presumably because the nebulous “parable” rather than the fable has dominated such efforts and led many down the garden path. If the traditions are not somehow independent of one another, then it is evident that some of the authors of the rabbinic period were not merely familiar with fables, but with the folk traditions about Aesop and The Life of Aesop specifically.
Among the many fable tellers of antiquity, the most widely known to the ancients was Aesop. In addition to the fables attributed to him, around the first century CE, a popular biography was written about Aesop. In The Life (Vita Aesopi), Aesop spins fables to many ends, among them to solve riddles, teach lessons, explain the natural order, insult opponents, persuade audiences, and augur his unjust conviction, death, and the recompense that will be paid to the Delphians who kill him. Although he delivers a dozen or so fables in the course of the narrative (mostly about human characters), these are largely gathered in the final third of the story, once Aesop has won his freedom. The bulk of the biography, however, revolves around Aesop as a picaresque slave, who uses his folk wisdom to make fools of pretentious intellectuals, to get himself and others out of trouble, and to solve various riddles. Aesop is not formally educated, but relies instead on his natural wit throughout. Throughout the narrative, Aesop engages in battles of wits against all comers, especially intellectual elites whose rigid scholasticism is no match for the shrewd wisdom of the protagonist. He lampoons the pretentions of such intellectuals, has the perfect comeback to every heckler, and relishes in exposing false claims of wisdom. These scenes result in the frustration and humiliation of his interlocutors and a laugh for Aesop and the reader. Aesop’s main foil intellectual character is his master, Xanthus, who runs a philosophy school. In addition to this theme, there is the genuine good nature of Aesop, who performs many altruistic deeds. After showing kindness toward the disguised goddess, Isis, he also helps his masters solve riddles (e.g., Vit. Aes. 35–36 and 78–80), helps Xanthus to escape trouble (e.g., Vit. Aes. 69–74), and is hailed as a “true prophet” (Vit. Aes. 93). A substantial section of The Life (101–123) is pulled directly from the Tale of Ahiqar where Aesop adopts a more august self-presentation.33 The conclusion of The Life picks up on the early traditions known about Aesop. In a series of events with clear biblical parallels,34 he is framed and quickly convicted of being a blasphemer and temple thief. On his way to execution, Aesop tells a number of fables.
Since we will see parallels to these passages momentarily, it is worth offering a couple examples of Aesop’s brand of wisdom. While Aesop is still on the slave block, he begins the first battle of wits with his future master, Xanthus, who has brought his students with him to buy a slave. Xanthus says to his students, “Let us find out if he knows anything,” and initiates the first of many back-and-forths with Aesop that hang on Aesop’s use of word ambiguity. Approaching Aesop, Xanthus says:
“Good day to you.” Aesop: “And is there anything wrong with my day?” The students: “Fair enough, by the Muses. What was wrong with his day?” They were impressed with his apt retort. And Xanthus said, “Where do you come from?” Aesop: “from the flesh.” Xanthus: “That’s not what I mean. Where were you born?” Aesop: “In my mother’s belly.” Xanthus: “The devil take him. That’s not what I’m asking you, but in what place where you born?” Aesop: “My mother didn’t tell me whether it was in the bedroom or the dining room.” Xanthus said, “Tell me what you are by nationality.” Aesop: “A Phrygian.” Xanthus, “What do you know how to do?” Aesop, “Nothing at all.” … The students: Hey! He’s wonderful … By Hera, this Aesop has done a neat job of muzzling the professor.
Vit. Aes. 25–2635
Though he says so sarcastically, Xanthus’s later admission, “Well, I didn’t realise I had bought myself a master” (Vit. Aes. 28), is not a far cry from the truth. As part of this section of The Life involving Xanthus, Aesop engages in a particular habit that resonates with one of our later rabbinic fable tellers: sabotaging the master’s banquet.
A substantial proportion of this Xanthus section in The Life revolves around the banquet table. Aesop uses his wits to ruin his master’s banquets in order to prove a point. Here is one example:
Xanthus sent out invitations to the students who had entertained him at dinner and said to Aesop: “I’ve invited my friends to dinner; go cook the best, the finest thing imaginable.” Aesop said to himself, “I’ll show him not to order stupid things.” He went to the butcher shop and bought the tongues of all the slaughtered pigs, then returned and prepared them. When Xanthus and his friends reclined at the table, after drinking, Xanthus said, “Give us something to eat.” Aesop served each one a boiled tongue with a vinegar fish sauce. The students praised Xanthus and said, “Professor, your lunch is stuffed with philosophy, for first off you have given us tongues, by which the whole of philology is emitted, and best of all, cooked with water. For every tongue is set in liquid.” And so they ate happily. After the drinking, Xanthus said, “Aesop, give us something to eat.” He served each a tongue roasted with salt and pepper. The students said, “Wow, Professor,” said the students once more, “roasted tongue, very appropriately, since every tongue is sharpened by fire, and best of all, with salt and pepper; for the saltiness harmonizes with the tartness and the spiciness when they are united.” And again they ate happily. And after a short while Xanthus said, “Aesop, give us something to eat.” He gave each a spiced tongue, and the students said to one another, “Our tongues are sick of eating tongues. Don’t we have anything else to eat?” Again, Aesop served each a tongue soup. The students grew irritated and said, “How long will it be tongues? Phew, what a lunch!” So Xanthus became angry and said, “Aesop, don’t you have anything else?” And he replied, “No.” And Xanthus said, “Didn’t I tell you, you abominable thing, to buy whatever was fine and good?” Aesop said, “I am grateful that you are blaming me when men who are philosophers are present. You said whatever is fine and good. And what is better in life than the tongue? It is by the tongue that all philosophy and education have been established. It is by virtue of the tongue that there are givings and takings, greetings, purchases, opinions, songs, weddings; thanks to it cities are restored and cities are overturned. The tongue humbles a man and in turn elevates him. It is by virtue of the tongue that all life has its basis. So nothing is better than it.” The students said, “Yes, well put, by the Muses. It was your mistake, professor.” They went home, and all night long they suffered from seizures of diarrhea.
Vit. Aes. 51–5336
By the time Aesop wins his freedom from Xanthus, many banquets have been spoiled by comic and ingenious means. Through Aesop’s savoir faire on this and the many other occasions, he proves that he is more than meets the eye.
Transitioning then to the rabbinic materials, the following passage should have a familiar ring:
R. Simeon b. Gamaliel said to Tabbai his servant: “Go and buy me good food in the market.” He went and bought him tongue. He said to him: “Go and buy me bad food in the market.” He went and bought him tongue. Said he to him: “What is this? When I told you to get good food you bought me tongue, and when I told you to get bad food you also bought me tongue!” He replied: “Good comes from it and bad comes from it. When the tongue is good there is nothing better, and when it is bad there is nothing worse.” Rabbi made a feast for his disciples and placed before them tender tongues and hard tongues. They began selecting the tender ones, leaving the hard ones alone. Said he to them: “Note what you are doing! As you select the tender and leave the hard, so let your tongues be tender to one another!” Accordingly Moses admonishes Israel by saying: “And if thou sell aught … ye shall not wrong one another.”
Lev. Rab. 33:1 [trans. Soncino]37
Here Leviticus Rabbah appears to offer an adaptation of the passage from The Life of Aesop quoted above.38 The clever slaves, Aesop and Tabbai, teach their masters a lesson by means of the tongue. Besides fable telling, what are today the lesser-known characteristics of Aesop in The Life described above and exemplified in this banquet find a very strong resonance with a particular tanna named Bar Kappara.
Bar Kappara (ca. 180–220 CE) was a Jewish Aesop it seems.39 According to tradition, he was a student of Judah the Patriarch with whom he had a famous falling out. Bar Kappara was born in Caesarea, where he would later establish his own academy as a rival school to that of his master. Several stories are transmitted about him that relate Bar Kappara’s Aesopic brand of comic wisdom, such as the episodes in b. Ned. 50–51:
On the day when Rabbi (Judah the Patriarch) would laugh, calamity40 would befall the world.41 He said to bar Kappara, “Don’t make me laugh and I’ll give you forty measures of wheat.” Bar Kappara replied, “Master will see that any measure I want I will take.” He took a large palm basket, covered it with pitch,42 flipped it upside down and put it on his head. He came out and said, “Master, give me forty measures of wheat that you owe me!” Rabbi (Judah the Patriarch) laughed and said to him, “I warned you, don’t make me laugh!” Bar Kappara said, “I’m only taking from you the wheat you owe me.”
b. Ned. 50b–51a [trans. Soncino, adapted]43
In his first appearance in this tractate, we learn immediately of Bar Kappara’s reputation for causing laughter. Like Xanthus, Judah the Patriarch is the founder of a school, takes himself too seriously, and is the perfect orthodox foil for the antics of a gadfly like Bar Kappara. Much like Aesop, Bar Kappara wreaks havoc and finds an ingenious way to win the battle of wits, exposing the pretentions of his master—the world did not end. Bar Kappara proves that the fate of the world does not depend on Judah the Patriarch. While humour in The Life of Aesop is often so ribald and over the top that it is hardly disputable, here it is perhaps more subtle but made explicit through the terminology. In this episode with Bar Kappara, the repetition of “laughter” provides the direct signal that the episode is intended to be comic. The scene thus creates a blend of wisdom and comedy that functions both at the narrative level and at the reader-level to contest the notion that austerity is to be equated with wisdom.
In addition to these antics, we find that Bar Kappara also loves to ruin his master’s banquets. He accomplishes this by using techniques familiar from The Life, including plays on words and riddles:
Bar Kappara once said to Rabbi Judah the Patriarch’s daughter: “Tomorrow I will drink wine to your father’s dancing and your mother’s croaking.”44 Ben Eleasha, Judah the Patriarch’s son-in-law, was a very wealthy man. Judah the Patriarch invited ben Eleasha to the wedding of his son, Rabbi Simeon ben Rabbi. At the wedding Bar Kappara said to Judah the Patriarch, “What is meant by ‘toʿebah’ (
b. Ned. 51a [trans. Soncino, adapted]51תועבה cf. Lev 18:22)45?” Now, every explanation offered by Judah the Patriarch was refuted by Bar Kappara, so Judah the Patriarch said to him, “Explain it yourself.” He replied, “Let your wife come and fill me a cup of wine.” She came and did so, upon which he said to Judah the Patriarch, “Get up and dance for me so that I may tell you.” This is what the Merciful One says, “toʿebah’ means toʾeh attah bah (תועה אתה בה , “you are straying after it”).”46 At his second cup, Bar Kappara asked Judah the Patriarch, “What is meant by tebel (תבל cf. Lev 18:23)47?” He answered as before (refuted each time by Bar Kappara). Bar Kappara said, “Perform for me, so that I may tell you.” He did so and Bar Kappara said, “‘tbel hu’ means, ‘teblin yesh bah (תבלין יש בה “is there perfume in it?”)?’48 Is this different such that going into it is better than anything else?” Then Judah the Patriarch said, “And what is zimmah (זימה cf. Lev 18:17)?”49 Bar Kappara told him, “Do as before,” and when he did, Bar Kappara said, “‘zimmah’ means ‘zo mah hi (זו מה היא , “to him what is she?”)?’”50 Ben Eleasha could not endure anymore, so he and his wife left.
In the span of this short story, Bar Kappara accomplishes what Aesop required several banquets to do. Bar Kappara humiliates Rabbi’s wife and his master by convincing him to dance on command at his son’s wedding, presumably to the embarrassment of the other guests as well. The blush-inducing subject-matter of the riddles—homosexual intercourse, bestiality, and incest—is unlikely to be coincidental. These topics are both wildly inappropriate for a solemn occasion but especially effective topics to lampoon a wedding. In the sexual impropriety, there is a certain resemblance to one of Aesop’s ruined banquets, which involved him exposing the master’s wife’s backside to the guests (Vit. Aes. 77a [W recension]). There is perhaps another jab at the pedantry of his fellow rabbis via Judah the Patriarch: Rabbi’s obsession with resolving biblical minutia makes him oblivious that he is making a fool of himself, embarrassing the other guests by his actions, and discussing inappropriate subject-matter for a wedding. The story concludes with Judah the Patriarch’s son-in-law and wife leaving the wedding in embarrassment. We are left to imagine how the bride and groom felt. Like Aesop, Bar Kappara is depicted outwitting the master using word games, demonstrating his superior wisdom by solving problems the master cannot, and showing the reliance of the master on his social inferior. By embarrassing their masters, they both depict a satisfying triumph of the lowly over the elite and communicate that obsession with wisdom can make one a fool.
That Bar Kappara is part of this literary typology of the fable teller associated with Aesop finds added confirmation by a second ruined banquet that ties this cunning wisdom together with fable telling. In this banquet, the narrative turns on both Aesopic behaviour and the telling of fables:
Like the wedding feast before, Bar Kappara succeeds at sabotaging his master’s ambitions through ingenuity. With the proverbial cold dishes, Bar Kappara gets his revenge against Judah the Patriarch for neglecting to invite him. In addition to the characteristically Aesopic banquet scenes, this episode firmly establishes Bar Kappara’s ties to the Aesopic tradition in his ability to captivate an audience with hundreds of fox fables. If there was any doubt about how to render mashal in this case, the connection to the fox, the emblematic fable animal of the Aesopic tradition, ties the Jewish and Aesopic fables together.54
4 Conclusion
Scholars of the Bible and rabbinic literature are generally unacquainted with the ancient fable materials and the scholarship on them. This is unsurprising given that professional classicists are rarely acquainted with these materials either. Even a cursory exploration such as this, shows that bringing the ancient fable materials into the scholarly discourse around “parables” and rabbinic meshalim carries with it the potential to reorient how we think about these texts.
I began with a very brief introduction to some fable materials and then surveyed the terminological quagmire that is the “parable,” particularly with respect to the rabbinic mashal. I gave a thumbnail sketch of how the ancient fable clarifies these major conundrums and fills in the many gaps in our knowledge that have left us to speculate until now. I pointed to the (re)emerging view that “narrative parables” are to be identified with “fables.” Given that the “parable” concept is derived from the Synoptic Gospels, has essentially no external evidence to support it as a discrete ancient genre, and is imbued with Christian theology, there is little to recommend using the term “parable” in discussions of rabbinic meshalim. The genre of brief fictitious narratives told in the past tense about the actions of certain characters, conveying some truth external to the story that is regularly summed up in a nimshal or epimythium—is the fable. I suggest that if one does not wish simply to use “mashal” when writing in English, the literarily appropriate and theologically less problematic term to use is “fable.”
I then pointed to some contexts in which fables were widely used that bear a clear resemblance to the rabbinic mashal: rhetoric, especially legal argumentation, and education. The use of the mashal for these purposes, I suggest, is perfectly in keeping with the well-established uses of the fable from which the rabbis would have drawn. Although beyond the scope of a short paper, this concinnous use of mashal and fable in these elite discourses merits further study. Finally, I identified the presence of the other stream of fable tradition in rabbinic literature as well: the low-wisdom Aesopic character persona recrudescing in rabbinic narratives. Here, I showed that the lore of the folk fable teller served as a paradigm for certain rabbinic spinners of meshalim, including apparent direct borrowings in narratives about Bar Kappara.
Far from a genre springing suddenly from a Jewish or Christian context, a new perspective on these Jewish fables sees them within the thriving fable-telling culture going on around them in the early centuries of the Common Era. This perspective provides a new way to read early Christian and Jewish fables together as part of a broader Mediterranean and Near Eastern phenomenon. Bringing rabbinic materials into the discussion of the ancient fable also provides much new material for fable scholarship, which has essentially ignored rabbinic materials. As many are encountering this genre for the first time, the ancient fable offers many opportunities for collaboration between scholars of Classics, the New Testament, and Rabbinics.
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Jülicher, Adolf. Die Gleichnisreden Jesu. 2 vols. Freiburg: Mohr Siebeck, 1899.
Lischer, Richard. Reading the Parables. Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2014.
Mell, Ulrich. Die Gleichnisreden Jesu 1899–1999: Beiträge zum Dialog mit Adolf Jülicher. BZNW 103. Berlin: De Gruyter, 1999.
Oegema, Albertina, Jonathan Pater, and Martijn Stoutjesdijk, eds. Overcoming Dichotomies: Parables, Fables, and Similes in the Graeco-Roman World. WUNT 483. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2022.
Ottenheijm, Eric and Marcel Poorthuis, eds. Parables in Changing Contexts: Essays on the Study of Parables in Christianity, Judaism, Islam, and Buddhism. JCP 35. Leiden: Brill, 2020.
Parsons, Mikeal, and Michael Martin. Ancient Rhetoric and the New Testament: The Influence of Elementary Greek Composition. Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2018.
Perry, Ben E. “The Origin of the Epimythium.” TAPA 71 (1940): 391–419.
Perry, Ben E. Aesopica: A Series of Texts Relating to Aesop or Ascribed to Him or Closely Connected with the Literary Tradition That Bears His Name. Vol. 1. Greek and Latin Texts. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1952.
Perry, Ben E. Babrius and Phaedrus: Fables. LCL 436. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1965.
Schwarzbaum, Haim. “Talmudic-Midrashic Affinities in Some Aesopic Fables.” Laographia 22 (1965): 466–483.
Schwarzbaum, Haim. “The Fables of Aesop and the Parables of the Sages.” Maḥanayim 112 (1967): 112–117 (Hebrew).
Scott, Bernard Brandon. Hear Then the Parable: A Commentary on the Parables of Jesus. Minneapolis: Fortress, 1989.
Shiner, Whitney. “Creating Plot in Episodic Narratives: The Life of Aesop and the Gospel of Mark.” Pages 155–176 in Ancient Fiction and Early Christian Narrative. Edited by Ronald F. Hock, J. Bradley Chance, and Judith Perkins. SBLSS 6. Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1998.
Singer, Isodore, ed. The Jewish Encyclopedia. 12 vols. New York: Funk & Wagnalls, 1901–1906.
Stern, David. Parables in Midrash: Narrative and Exegesis in Rabbinic Literature. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1991.
Strong, Justin David. “How to Interpret Parables in Light of the Fable: The Promythium and Epimythium.” Pages 327–352 in Overcoming Dichotomies: Parables, Fables, and Similes in the Graeco-Roman World. Edited by Albertina Oegema, Jonathan Pater, and Martijn Stoutjesdijk. WUNT 483. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2022.
Strong, Justin David. The Fables of Jesus in the Gospel of Luke: A New Foundation for the Study of Parables. SCCB 5. Paderborn: Brill, 2021.
Teugels, Lieve M. “Talking Animals in Parables: A Contradictio in Terminis?” Pages 129–148 in Parables in Changing Contexts: Essays on the Study of Parables in Christianity, Judaism, Islam, and Buddhism. Edited by Eric Ottenheijm and Marcel Poorthuis. JCP 35. Leiden: Brill, 2020.
Van Dijk, Gert-Jan. Ainoi, Logoi, Mythoi: Fables in Archaic, Classical, and Hellenistic Greek Literature: With a Study of the Theory and Terminology of the Genre. MnemSup 166. Leiden: Brill, 1997.
Van Segroeck, Frans, Christopher M. Tuckett, Gilbert van Belle, and Joseph Verheyden, eds. The Four Gospels: Festschrift for Frans Neirynck. BETL 100. Leuven: Peeters, 1992.
Vouga, François. “Formgeschichtliche Überlegungen zu den Gleichnissen und zu den Fabeln der Jesus-Tradition auf dem Hintergrund der hellenistischen Literaturgeschichte.” Pages 173–187 in The Four Gospels: Festschrift for Frans Neirynck. Edited by Frans van Segroeck, Christopher M. Tuckett, Gilbert van Belle, and Joseph Verheyden. BETL 100. Leuven: Peeters, 1992.
Vouga, François. “Zur form- und redaktionsgeschichtlichen Definition der Gattungen: Gleichnis, Parabel/Fabel, Beispielerzählungen.” Pages 75–95 in Die Gleichnisreden Jesu 1899–1999: Beiträge zum Dialog mit Adolf Jülicher. Edited by Ulrich Mell. BZNW 103. Berlin: De Gruyter, 1999.
Vouga, François. “Die Parabeln Jesu und die Fabeln Äsops. Ein Beitrag zur Gleichnisforschung und zur Problematik der Literalisierung der Erzählungen der Jesus-Tradition.” WD 26 (2001): 149–164.
Yassif, Eli. The Hebrew Folktale: History, Genre, Meaning. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1999.
This research received support by the German Research Foundation (DFG).
Ben Edwin Perry, arguably the most influential scholar of the Greek and Latin fable in the twentieth century, writes, “This is a perfect and complete definition provided we understand the range of what is included under the terms
From the hundreds of examples, the fables preserved in collections are remarkably consistent. Those embedded in meta-narrative contexts vary more, naturally, according to the author’s proclivities, but remain easily recognizable. To the defining characteristics, some fable scholars would have no problem including the present tense, though normally one encounters just the “historical present.”
For those unacquainted, meshalim is the plural of mashal, the word used in rabbinic Hebrew for “parables.” The Aramaic term, mathla, is synonymous with the Hebrew term, mashal. I employ the term mashal here throughout for simplicity, but the discussion applies to the cognate in Aramaic literature as well.
The only monograph-length study to address this issue in detail is by present author: Justin David Strong, The Fables of Jesus in the Gospel of Luke: A New Foundation for the Study of Parables, SCCB 5 (Paderborn: Brill, 2021). Since this is the case, I regret that I must often refer to my own work in the course of this article. Prior to this, the most recent monograph-length study to investigate the matter is that of Adolf Jülicher from over a century ago (Die Gleichnisreden Jesu, 2 vols [Freiburg: Mohr Siebeck, 1899]). He and I have reached similar conclusions. After Jülicher, the fable did not feature in parable scholarship in any serious way for the better part of a century. David Flusser offered some thoughts on the parable as emerging from the fable in scattered passages of his Die rabbinischen Gleichnisse und der Gleichniserzähler Jesus, vol. 1, Das Wesen der Gleichnisse (Bern: Lang, 1981). To date, the most important article on the subject is by Mary Ann Beavis, who shows the synonymity of many parables and fables, concluding that many early Christians would understand “parables” just as fables, see Mary Ann Beavis, “Parable and Fable,” CBQ 52 (1990): 473–498. Shortly thereafter, François Vouga published several articles on this issue and he broadly follows Jülicher in his perspective that narrative parables are fables: François Vouga, “Zur form- und redaktionsgeschichtlichen Definition der Gattungen: Gleichnis, Parabel/Fabel, Beispielerzählungen,” in Die Gleichnisreden Jesu 1899–1999: Beiträge zum Dialog mit Adolf Jülicher, ed. Ulrich Mell, BZNW 103 (Berlin: De Gruyter, 1999), 75–95; François Vouga, “Die Parabeln Jesu und die Fabeln Äsops. Ein Beitrag zur Gleichnisforschung und zur Problematik der Literalisierung der Erzählungen der Jesus-Tradition,” WD 26 (2001): 149–164; François Vouga, “Formgeschichtliche Überlegungen zu den Gleichnissen und zu den Fabeln der Jesus-Tradition auf dem Hintergrund der hellenistischen Literaturgeschichte,” in The Four Gospels: Festschrift for Frans Neirynck, ed. Frans van Segroeck, Christopher M. Tuckett, Gilbert van Belle, and Joseph Verheyden, BETL 100 (Leuven: Peeters, 1992), 173–187. The past few (and forthcoming years) show an emerging interest in this question. Mikeal Parsons and Michael Martin have a chapter arguing that the parables are equivalent to what the gospel authors would have learned as the fable in their rhetorical training (Ancient Rhetoric and the New Testament: The Influence of Elementary Greek Composition [Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2018], 45–70). Lieve Teugels has recently demonstrated that the category distinction of “parables” and “fables” on the basis of talking animals does not hold (“Talking Animals in Parables: A Contradictio in Terminis?” in Parables in Changing Contexts: Essays on the Study of Parables in Christianity, Judaism, Islam, and Buddhism, ed. Marcel Poorthuis and Eric Ottenheijm, JCP 35 [Leiden: Brill, 2020], 129–148. Albertina Oegema, Jonathan Pater, and Martijn Stoutjesdijk, ed. Overcoming Dichotomies: Parables, Fables, and Similes in the Graeco-Roman World, WUNT 483 (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2022) contains several articles addressing aspects of the question and makes a significant contribution to this area.
See, for example, the discussion in K.-M. Beyse, “
David Stern, Parables in Midrash: Narrative and Exegesis in Rabbinic Literature (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1991), 9–10. Yes, this includes even Nathan’s Ewe Lamb (2 Sam 12), which receives no genre label in the Hebrew Bible. Josephus is the first to ascribe a genre label to it (Josephus, Ant. 7.7.3 [147–151]) and he labels it a
Bernard Brandon Scott, Hear Then the Parable: A Commentary on the Parables of Jesus (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1989), 8.
For many examples, see Strong, Fables of Jesus, 201–225.
The Gospels of John, Thomas, and apparently not even Q use the term
While the term “parable” is innocuous in common parlance and few among the public are aware of its origin in the Gospels, for specialist studies such as ours, the terms we use should not be applied uncritically. The term is entrenched in Christian theological convictions and tacit supersessionism that holds Jesus to be the first parable teller, the best parable teller, and even the inventor of the genre, “parable.” Especially for rabbinic specialists who are less familiar with New Testament studies and Modern Hebrew speakers for whom English is not a native language, these facts may give pause for rendering mashal into English with “parable.”
This historical curiosity has been acknowledged by scholars of every stripe. See Strong, Fables of Jesus, 3–5.
Stern, Parables in Midrash, 10.
Eli Yassif, The Hebrew Folktale: History, Genre, Meaning (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1999), 191.
For fable scholars without the same skin in the game, this is not so controversial. Van Dijk simply writes, for example, “A fundamental difference between fable and parable does not exist” (Ainoi, Logoi, Mythoi, 36). Parable scholars will often use language such as “true parable” or “narrative parable” when they wish to specify what most understand by the term “parable.” Richard Lischer explains, “What is sometimes called a ‘true parable’ is a freely invented short story with two or more characters whose action is cast into the past tense” (Reading the Parables [Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2014], 33).
“Die Mehrzahl der
“Gefährlicher indess ist der Widerstand aus theologischen Motiven”; “More dangerous, however, is the resistance from theological motives” (Jülicher, Gleichnisreden Jesu, 1:100). At the time, the motivations included the need to assert the unique and unparalleled nature of Jesus’s teaching, the resistance to historical critical methodology, avoiding the many stigmas associated with the fable genre, and a more current one in the philojudaic interest in asserting the uniqueness of Judaism.
For an introduction to the ancient fable collections, see especially Holzberg, Ancient Fable.
Ἀνὴρ γεωργὸς μέλλων τελευτᾶν καὶ βουλόμενος τοὺς αὑτοῦ παῖδας ἐμπείρους εἶναι τῆς γεωργίας, μετακαλεσάμενος αὐτούς, ἔφη·φΤεκνία, ἐν μιᾷ μου τῶν ἀμπέλων θησαυρὸς ἀπόκειται. Οἱ δὲ μετὰ τὴν αὐτοῦ τελευτὴν ὕνας τε καὶ δικέλλας λαβόντες πᾶσαν αὑτῶν τὴν γεωργίαν ὤρυξαν. Καὶ τὸν μὲν θησαυρὸν οὐχ εὗρον, ἡ δὲ ἄμπελος πολλαπλασίαν τὴν φορὰν αὐτοῖς ἀπεδίδου.
Τοῦτο μὲν ἔγνωσαν ὅτι ὁ κάματος θησαυρός ἐστι τοῖς ἀνθρώποις.
Λέων εἰς γεωργοῦ ἔπαυλιν εἰσῆλθεν. Ὁ δὲ συλλαβεῖν βουλόμενος τὴν αὐλείαν θύραν ἔκλεισε. Καὶ ὃς ἐξελθεῖν μὴ δυνάμενος πρῶτον μὲν τὰ ποίμνια διέφθειρεν, ἔπειτα δὲ καὶ ἐπὶ τοὺς βόας ἐτράπη. Καὶ ὁ γεωργὸς φοβηθεὶς περὶ αὑτοῦ τὴν θύραν ἀνέῳξεν. Ἀπαλλαγέντος δὲ τοῦ λέοντος, ἠ γυνὴ θεασαμένη αὐτὸν στένοντα εἶπεν· “Ἀλλὰ σύ γε δίκαια πέπονθας· τί γὰρ τοῦτον συγκλεῖσαι ἐβούλου ὃν καὶ μακρόθεν σε ἔδει φεύγειν;” Οὕτως οἱ τοὺς ἰσχυροτέρους διερεθίζοντες εἰκότως τὰς ἐξ αὑτῶν πλημμελείας ὑπομένουσιν.
Like fishermen fables, shepherd fables, and so on, farmer fables are practically a sub-genre. In my fable and subject indexes, I have gathered an extensive list of fables for most subjects that would be relevant (see Strong, The Fables of Jesus, 585–595 and 621–629 respectively).
Δύο νεανίσκοι ἐν ταὐτῷ κρέας ὠνοῦντο. Καὶ δὴ τοῦ μαγείρου περισπασθέντος, ὁ ἕτερος ὑφελόμενος ἀκροκώλιον, εἰς τὸν τοῦ ἑτέρου κόλπον καθῆκεν. Ἐπιστραφέντος δὲ αὐτοῦ καὶ ἐπιζητοῦντος, αἰτιωμένου τε ἐκείνους, ὁ μὲν εἰληφὼς ὤμνυε μὴ ἔχειν, ὁ δὲ ἔχων μὴ εἰληφέναι. Καῖ ὁ μάγειρος αἰσθόμενος αὐτῶν τὴν κακοτεχνίαν, εἶπεν· Ἀλλὰ κἂν ἐμὲ λάθητε ἐπιορκοῦντες, θεοὺς μέντοι γε οὐ λήσετε. Ὁ λόγος δηλοῖ ὅτι ἡ αὐτή ἐστιν ἡ ἀσέβεια τῆς ἐπιορκίας, κἂν αὐτήν τις κατασοφίζηται.
Ὁ μῦθος δηλοῖ ὅτι, κἂν ἀνθρώπους ἐπιορκοῦντες λάθωμεν, ἀλλὰ τόν γε θεὸν οὐ λήσομεν.
It is problematic to equate the fables of Jesus, as a character in the gospel narratives, with those of the historical Jesus. I do so here simply for convenience. One of the outcomes of recognizing the fable as the appropriate context is the removal of the primary pillar that supported uncritically assigning all fables of Jesus in the Gospels to the historical figure. The reason has been, namely, that no one else was telling “parables” and so no one else could have invented them and attributed them to Jesus. The ubiquity of the ancient fable demonstrates this assumption to be false.
Theon gives such a list, for example, “Fables are called Aesopic [probably Aethiopic] and Libyan or Sybaritic, and Phrygian and Cilician and Carian, Egyptian, and Cyprian,”
Continuing where Aphthonius left off from the previous footnote, “Some fables are rational, some ethical, some mixed: rational when a human being is imagined as doing something, ethical when representing the character of irrational animals, mixed when made up of both, irrational and rational,”
οἱ δὲ λέγοντες τοὺς μὲν ἐπὶ τοῖς ἀλόγοις ζώοις συγκειμένους τοιούσδε εἶναι, τοὺς δὲ ἐπ’ ἀνθρώποις τοιούσδε, τοὺς μὲν ἀδυνάτους τοιούσδε, τοὺς δὲ δυνατῶν ἐχομένους τοιούσδε, εὐήθως μοι ὑπολαμβάνειν δοκοῦσιν.
See, for example, Richard Hidary, Rabbis and Classical Rhetoric: Sophistic Education and Oratory in the Talmud and Midrash (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2018). See already Henry A. Fischel, ed., Essays in Greco-Roman and Related Talmudic Literature (New York: Ktav, 1977) and Catherine Hezser, “Die Verwendung Der Hellenistischen Gattung Chrie Im Frühen Christentum Und Judentum,” JSJ 27 (1996): 371–439.
On the use of the fable in ancient education, see Strong, The Fables of Jesus, 131–172.
Like Bar Kappara, Rabbi Meir attests to a tradition of rabbis who know hundreds of fox fables—the number three hundred appearing in both cases. While three hundred may of course be conventional (so Stern, Parables in Midrash, 298), it is not necessarily so. From Babrius’s collection about two hundred fables survive, while the Augustana Collection numbers about 250.
On the ambiguous meaning of “fables of fullers (
On the relationship between the fable text and framing devices like the epimythium and nimshal, see Justin David Strong, “How to Interpret Parables in Light of the Fable: The Promythium and Epimythium,” in Overcoming Dichotomies, 327−352; Strong, The Fables of Jesus, 382–448; Ben E. Perry, “The Origin of the Epimythium,” TAPA 71 (1940): 391–419.
This is, of course, from the perspective that there are two separate things called “parables” and “fables”: e.g., Haim Schwarzbaum, “Talmudic-Midrashic Affinities of Some Aesopic Fables,” Laographia 22 (1965): 466–483; Haim Schwarzbaum, “The Fables of Aesop and the Parables of the Sages,” Maḥanayim 112 (1967): 112–117 (Hebrew); Joseph Jacobs, “Aesop’s Fables among the Jews,” in The Jewish Encyclopedia, ed. Isodore Singer, 12 vols. (New York: Funk & Wagnalls, 1901–1906), 1:221–222; Galit Hasan-Rokem, “Fable” in Encyclopedia Judaica, ed. Fred Skolnik and Michael Berenbaum, 2nd ed., 22 vols (Detroit: Macmillan Reference USA, 2007), 6:666–670.
The Life of Aesop is, in fact, our best attestation of the lost Greek text of The Tale of Ahiqar. The dependence on Ahiqar is just one of several clear indications that the fable genre crossed fluidly between Hellenistic and Semitic milieus.
The inhabitants of the city hide a temple vessel in Aesop’s bag in order to accuse him of being a temple thief (cf. Gen 44). Aesop gets into this situation by insulting the people for considering themselves worthy of their ancestors. Initially, they enjoy his message, but they soon turn on him and kill him by throwing him from a cliff (cf. Luke 4:16–30).
προσελθὼν δὲ ὁ Ξάνθος τῷ Αἰσώπῳ φησίν· “χαῖρε.” Αἴσωπος· “τί γάρ; λυποῦμαι;” οἱ σχολαστικοί· “καλῶς, μὰ τὰς μούσας. τί γάρ; ἐλυπεῖτο;” ⟨κατεπλάγησαν οὖν⟩ τῷ εὐστόχῳ λόγῳ. καί φησιν αὐτῷ ὁ Ξάνθος· “ποταπὸς εἶ;” ὁ Αἴσωπος· “σάρκινος.” ὁ Ξάνθος· “οὐ τοῦτο λέγω, ἀλλὰ ποῦ ἐγεννήθης;” ὁ Αἴσωπος· “ἐν τῇ κοιλίᾳ τῆς μητρός μου.” ὁ Ξάνθος· “πάντα αὐτῷ κακά. οὐ τοῦτό σε ἐρωτῶ, ἀλλὰ ποίῳ τόπῳ ἐγεννήθης;” ὁ Αἴσωπος· “τοῦτό μοι οὐκ εἶπεν ἡ μήτηρ μου, πότερον [ἢ] ἐν τῷ κοιτῶνι ἢ ἐν τῷ τρικλίνῳ.” ὁ Ξάνθος λέγει· “γένει, λέγω, ποταπὸς εἶ;” ὁ Αἴσωπος· “Φρύξ.” ὁ Ξάνθος· “τί οἶδας ποιεῖν;” ὁ Αἴσωπος· “ἐγὼ ὅλως οὐδέν.” … οἱ σχολαστικοί· “οὐᾶ, μακάριος·… οἱ σχολαστικοί· “καλῶς, μὰ τὴν Ἥραν· ὁ Αἴσωπος ἀπεστομάτισεν τὸν καθηγητήν.”
Unless stated otherwise, quotations of The Life of Aesop are taken from the standard translation of the “G” text, found in Lloyd W. Daly, Aesop without Morals: The Famous Fables and a Life of Aesop (New York: Yoseloff, 1961).
τῇ ἐπαύριον καλέσας ὁ Ξάνθος τοὺς ἤδη καλέσαντας αὐτὸν σχολαστικοὺς λέγει· “Αἴσωπε, ἐπειδὴ φίλους κέκληκα ἐπὶ δεῖπνον, ἀπελθὼν ὀψώνησον εἴ τι καλόν, εἴ τι χρηστὸν ἐν τῷ βίῳ.” Αἴσωπος πρὸς ἑαυτὸν λέγει· “ἐγὼ αὐτῷ δείξω μωρὰ μὴ διατάττεσθαι.” ἐλθὼν οὖν εἰς τὸν μάκελλον τῶν τεθυμένων χοιριδίων τὰς γλώσσας ἠγόρασεν, καὶ ἐλθὼν τὰς μὲν ἐκζεστάς, τὰς δὲ ὀπτάς, τὰς δὲ ἀρτυτάς, πάσας ἡτοίμασεν. καὶ τῇ τακτῇ ὥρᾳ παραγίνονται οἱ κεκλημένοι. ὁ Ξάνθος λέγει· “Αἴσωπε, δὸς ἡμῖν τι φαγεῖν.” Αἴσωπος φέρει ἑκάστῳ γλῶσσαν γενομένην ἐκζεστήν, καὶ ὀξύγαρον παρέθηκεν. οἱ σχολαστικοὶ εἶπον· “οὐᾶ, Ξάνθε, καὶ τὸ δεῖπνόν σου φιλοσοφίας μεστόν· οὐδὲν γὰρ παρὰ σοὶ ἀφιλοπόνητον. εὐθέως γὰρ ἐν ἀρχῇ τοῦ δείπνου αἱ γλῶσσαι παρετέθησαν.” (52) καὶ μετὰ τὸ πιεῖν αὐτοὺς δύο ἢ τρία ποτήρια ὁ Ξάνθος λέγει· “Αἴσωπε, δὸς ἡμῖν φαγεῖν.” Αἴσωπος ἑκάστῳ πάλιν πρὸς γλῶσσαν ὀπτὴν καὶ ἁλοπέπερι παρέθηκεν. οἱ σχολαστικοὶ εἶπον· “θείως, καθηγητά, καλλίστως, μὰ τὰς μούσας. ἐπεὶ πᾶσα γλῶσσα πυρὶ ἠκόνηται, καὶ τὸ κρεῖττον, ὅτι δι’ ἁλοπεπέρεως· τὸ γὰρ ἁλυκὸν τῷ δριμυτέρῳ συγκέκραται τῆς γλώσσης ἵνα τὸ εὔστομον καὶ τὸ δάκνον ἐπιδείξῃ.” ὁ Ξάνθος πάλιν μετὰ τὸ πιεῖν αὐτοὺς τὸ τρίτον λέγει· “φέρε ἡμῖν φαγεῖν.” Αἴσωπος ἑκάστῳ γλῶσσαν ἀρτυτὴν φέρει. οἱ σχολαστικοὶ εἷς ἑνὶ ἔλεγον· “Δημόκριτε, ἐγὼ τὴν γλῶσσαν ἐπόνεσα τὰς γλώσσας τρώγων.” ἄλλος σχολαστικὸς εἶπεν· “οὐδέν ἐστι φαγεῖν ἕτερον; ὅπου Αἴσωπος πονεῖ, ἐκεῖ οὐδὲν ἀγαθόν ἐστι.” οἱ σχολαστικοὶ φαγόντες τὰς ἀρτυτὰς γλώσ-σας χολέρᾳ [ἀσθένια] ἐκρούσθησαν. ὁ Ξάνθος λέγει· “Αἴσωπε, δὸς ἡμῖν δειπνῆσαι ἑκάστῳ λοπάδα.” Αἴσωπος γλωσσόζωμον παρέθηκεν. οἱ σχολαστικοὶ οὐκέτι ἐξέτεινον τὰς χεῖρας, λέγοντες “ἥδε καταστροφὴ ἀπὸ Αἰσώπου· γλώσσαις νενικήμεθα.” ὁ Ξάνθος λέγει· “Αἴσωπε, ἔχομέν τι ἕτερον;” Αἴσωπος εἶπεν· “οὐδὲν ἄλλο ἔχομεν.” (53) ὁ Ξάνθος λέγει· “οὐδὲν ἕτερον, κατάρατε; οὐκ εἶπόν σοι ὅτι ‘εἴ τι χρήσιμόν ἐστιν ἐν τῷ βίῳ, εἴ τι δὲ ἡδύ, τοῦτο ἀγόρασον;’” Αἴσωπος λέγει· “χάριν σοι ἔχω, ὅτι ἀνδρῶν φιλολόγων παρόντων μέμφῃ με. εἶπάς μοι ὅτι ‘εἴ τι χρήσιμόν ἐστιν ἐν τῷ βίῳ, εἴ τι ἡδύτερον ἢ μεῖζον, ἀγόρασον.’ τί οὖν ἐστιν ἐν τῷ βίῳ γλώσσης χρησιμώτερον ἢ μεῖζον; μάθε ὅτι διὰ γλώσσης πᾶσα φιλοσοφία καὶ πᾶσα παιδεία συνέστηκεν. χωρὶς γλώσσης οὐδὲν γίνεται, οὐδὲ δόσις, οὐ λῆψις, οὐδὲ ἀγορασμός· ἀλλὰ διὰ γλώσσης πόλεις ἀνορθοῦνται, δόγματα καὶ νόμοι ὁρίζονται. εἰ οὖν διὰ γλώσσης πᾶς ⟨ὁ⟩ βίος συνέστηκεν, γλώσσης οὐδέν ἐστι κρεῖττον.” οἱ σχολαστικοὶ εἶπον· “νὴ τὰς μούσας, καλὰ λέγει. σὺ ἥμαρτες, καθηγητά.” οἱ σχολαστικοὶ ἀνεχώρησαν. δι’ ὅλης τῆς νυκτὸς διαρροίᾳ ληφθέντες ἐδυσφόρουν.
ָמַר רַבִּי שִׁמְעוֹן בֶּן גַּמְלִיאֵל לְטָבִי עַבְדֵיהּ פּוּק זְבֵין לִי צֵדוּ טָבָא מִן שׁוּקָא נָפַק זָבַן לֵיהּ לִשָּׁן, אָמַר לֵיהּ פּוּק זְבֵין לִי צֵדוּ בִּישָׁא מִן שׁוּקָא נָפַק זָבַן לֵיהּ לִשָּׁן. אֲמַר לֵיהּ מַהוּ דֵּין דְּכַד אֲנָא אָמַר לָךְ צֵדוּ טָבָא אַתְּ זָבַן לִי לִשָּׁן וְכַד אֲנָא אֲמַר לָךְ צֵדוּ בִּישָׁא אַתְּ זָבַן לִי לִשָּׁן. אֲמַר לֵיהּ מִינָּהּ טָבְתָּא וּמִינָהּ בִּישְׁתָּא כַּד הֲוָה טַב לֵית טָבָה מִנֵּיהּ וְכַד בִּישׁ לֵית בִּישׁ מִנֵּיהּ. רַבִּי עָשָׂה סְעוּדָה לְתַלְמִידָיו הֵבִיא לִפְנֵיהֶם לְשׁוֹנוֹת רַכִּים וּלְשׁוֹנוֹת קָשִׁים הִתְחִילוּ בּוֹרְרִין בָּרַכִּים וּמַנִּיחִין הַקָּשִׁים אָמַר לָהֶם דְּעוּ מָה אַתֶּם עוֹשִׂין כְּשֵׁם שֶׁאַתֶּם בּוֹרְרִין אֶת הָרַכִּין וּמַנִּיחִין אֶת הַקָּשִׁים כָּךְ יִהְיֶה לְשׁוֹנְכֶם רַךְ אֵלּוּ לָאֵלּוּ לְפִיכָךְ משֶׁה מַזְהִיר אֶת יִשְׂרָאֵל וְכִי תִמְכְּרוּ מִמְכָּר.
It is unlikely that the Aesopic and rabbinic episodes are independent. The rabbinic scene is prompted by a reference to a basket of figs that recalls a famous opening scene from Vit. Aes. 2–3.
To be clear, I am discussing his characterization in rabbinic narratives and do not wish to argue for anything specific about the historical figures that stand behind them.
The tradition refers to the belief that Judah the Patriarch’s sufferings would atone for the sins of the Jewish people; this story plays with the inverse idea that his pleasure would destroy it.
Aside from the comedic appearance, there are a number of possible puns with the name Kappara,
The Soncino and other translations render the mother’s act as “singing,” though, according to Jastrow,
Generally translated “abomination,” here it refers to sexual intercourse between men.
Generally translated something like “abominable confusion,” referring to bestiality between an animal and a woman.
Again, there are a couple interpretive options for the laconic phrase, one vulgar and the other very vulgar. Specifically, the ambiguity concerns to what “in it” refers; namely, is there spice/perfume, i.e., attractiveness in the act of sex with the animal, or is there perfume inside the animal that makes intercourse with it appealing.
Usually translated “wickedness” or “depravity.” The verse concerns sleeping with both a woman and her daughter or granddaughter.
That is, “is she his wife or his daughter?”
The Aramaic expression here (
This is a longer version of a much-abbreviated description of these events that takes place immediately before the episode of the tar drenched basked. A parallel version of this story is found in Lev. Rab. 28:2
The earliest visual depiction of Aesop appears on “The Aesop Cup.” It shows a fox conversing with (or teaching) Aesop and is dated between 460–430 BCE. For further details and an image, see Strong, The Fables of Jesus, 76.