THE MYSTERY Why does the Torah call tefillin totafot and what does the word mean? T THE MYSTERY Why are there two versions of the Ten Commandments? 211111111111111111 1 ---:,: - - 4,.. -- -- . . , ....,. - . .,........== . . . . . „ . . - ,. _ ......... 7- ... ■ --...... • ,,. -4.... ''' Itt ..: - — ----... • vv., • - .„ 7 • - . Z. :: - ...-. • - - ' T _ -- :' - ':,.. , -. - -- -"' ' -:: ---..- •::--'.- ■ --- . - - • -': - -•:7:2 • "Z.. - ' - ....- --.. ..... - -- z------. *N;;-- • ---7 : . .. :. ■ ,, - 3:. • 4 4,„ • - he investigation into this mystery must be- gin by considering the different times the two Ten Commandment versions are cited, according to Rabbi Dan- nel Schwartz of Temple Shir Shalom. In Exodus, the Jewish peo- ple is not yet established. When God gives the Ten Commandments here, it is to a more universal audience. His message: All persons should imitate God, and one of the ways to do so is to re- member the Sabbath day. Everyone should rest on Shabbat just as God Himself did. God's relationship with the Jewish people is quite different in Deuteronomy, Rabbi Schwartz said. By this time, the Jewish nation is established and has been given a series of rules they are to obey. Here, God is the redeemer, not just the creator, of the Jewish people. The Torah's focus becomes not simply God's role in the world at large, but His specific relationship to Jews. . •--._ -.' ,- --. :-:---„,. : --- .:_-'7_,--,.. -i,. --- ...,‹ z- . . :- ....-- „ - ,. , . __ -.. . . In Exodus, 20:2-14, one is commanded to "Remember the Sabbath." 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" "Remember" and "observe" — two words ap- plicable to the Sabbath —surface again and again in Jewish ritual, Rabbi Schwartz said. Jews also light two Shabbat candles, to remember and to observe. Lighting candles on Shabbat serves as the beginning of the observance of the day, while on its counterpart, Havdalah, the end of Shabbat, a candle signifies that one should remember the Sabbath will come again next week. Rabbi Schwartz said the Torah's repetition of the Ten Commandments serves an- other purpose, in addition to giving a message to both Jew and gentile. This second purpose is to emphasize the Commandments' impor- tance. "It's a way of saying, `You've got to really do these,' just as in Hebrew one repeats a word to make the phrase stronger," he said. "Maher means 'quick,' but maher, maher means, 'very quickly.' " he word totafot ap pears three times in the Torah — in Exodus 13:16 and Deuteronomy 6:8 and 11:18, and always in the same context according to Rabbi Eliot Pachter of Adat Shalom Synagogue. The Torah makes a fourth reference to tefillin, though this time referring to them as zicharon, from the Heb- rew word l'zkor, to re- member. "One obvious guess, then, is that totafot means a memory-stimulating ele- ment," Rabbi Pachter said. Rabbi Akiva and Rabbi Yishmael discussed at length the question of totafot. They wanted to know why totafot, the part of the tefillin placed on the forehead, contain four sec- tions while the yad, bound to the hand, contains just one. Rabbi Yishmael was in- trigued by the extra vav in one Torah reference to totafot. He was convinced the appearance of the additional letter was of importance in understanding the totafot. Rabbi Akiva, while usual- ly impressed by such theories, was not interested in the extra vav, Rabbi Pachter said. Instead, he postulated that totafot com- prised two words, tot and fot, each of which translated to the number 2 (thus explain- ing the four sections of the totafot). No one knows exact- ly what languages these words supposedly come from, Rabbi Pachter said, though Rabbi Akiva indicated fot was an African word. While Rabbi Pachter says the Torah's use of foreign language would indeed be strange, the Talmud sug- gests at one point that the word tot could mean two, "so maybe Rabbi Akiva is on to something." In fact, some modern scholars believe foreign words are used in the Torah, he added. Some researchers think the name Moses was an Egyptian word for "son." Yosef Lange, a Detroit- area scribe, also considered the four sides of the totafot when speaking recently before students at Adat Shalom, Rabbi Pachter said. Rabbi Lange suggested the four sides of the totafot are representative of the four senses that emanate from one's head: sight, hearing, smell and taste. But only one sense — touch — comes from the hand. Thus the totafot has four sides, but just one is on the yad. Tractate Shabbat in the Mishnah mentions totafot, though not in connection with the tefillin Jewish men use during davening, Rabbi Pachter said. The MiShnah passage gives direction as to exactly what a woman may wear on Shabbat. She may wear clothing and jewelry, but not just any jewelry. A woman must be espe- cially cautious wearing precious jewelry on the Sabbath. If this fell, the Mishnah says, she might be tempted to pick it up and ac- cidentally carry it (which would be forbidden without an eruv, a ritual boundary that makes it permissible to carry on the Sabbath). Addressing the issue of jewelry on Shabbat, the Mishnah specifically men- tions totefet, presumably the singular for totafot. That the Mishnah advises women to so securely fasten their totefet must have meant they were precious, Rabbi Pachter said. While the Mishnah does not explain exactly what totefet are —probably be- cause the word was well- known enough that no trans- lation was needed — the Gemarah describes them as a charm worn from ear to ear. And Rashi described the purpose of totefet as holding medicine to ward off the evil eye. Thus, Rabbi Pachter said, totefet could be con- sidered a kind of amulet. The word totafot appears only in the Torah and the prayer book. Separately, the tefillin are referred to as the tefilla shel cosh, bound to the head, and tefilla shel yad, bound to the upper arm. But in secular texts, totafot is translated as phylacteries, from the New Testament. Phylactery is related to the word prophylactic, and both ultimately stem from the Greek root work phulax, meaning guard. Rabbi Pachter suggests gentiles used the term "phylacteries" because they regarded totafot as magical charms Jews used to ward off the evil eye. THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS 23