Tafsiran yang Mengutip untuk Amsal 7:26

ACQUIRE A COLLEAGUE [Heb. chaver] (or FRIEND). Rav: even if you must purchase him at great cost and spend exhorbitant sums to acquire his friendship. But one cannot say of a teacher of Torah “acquire a teacher,” for the teacher must teach without charge. He was not sufficiently careful with what he wrote, for if he understood chaver to mean a colleague for Torah study—as would seem from his writing “but one cannot say of a teacher of Torah…”—then he shouldn’t have written “to acquire his friendship,” but “to acquire him as a colleague.” What happened is that Rav copied the first sentence from Rambam, who did not understand chaver as a colleague for Torah study, for he writes: “Acquire a chaver”—the mishna uses the language of acquisition… because a person most acquire a friend who will help him in properly arranging all of his affairs, as the Sages said (Ta`anit 23a), “friendship or death!” … And one should make efforts… to win his friendship…
Midrash Shmuel reports that R. Yehuda Lerma asked why the mishna does not enjoin one to acquire students, considering that the Sages said (Ta’anit 7a): I have learned much from my teachers… and from my students most of all! He explained this by noting that a student’s sole desire is to learn. Students therefore study only where their hearts desire and under the teachers from whom they feel they will gain the most. So if a person cannot find anyone who wishes to study under him, the tanna does not enjoin him to. Our master, Maharal, writes in Derech Chaim that the mishna does not say “acquire a student for yourself” because it isn’t proper for a person to appoint himself a master and create honor for himself by saying “come study under me,” as people do in these lands.<sup>27</sup>I.e., around Prague, where the Maharal was the Chief Rabbi.
Although what they say is certainly true, I don’t think the question is a good one to begin with,because this tanna’s ancient predecessors, the men of the Great Assembly, had already preceeded him in this when they said “train many students” (Avot 1:1). Now they had in mind only students interested in the teacher in question, as it is impossible to train a student against his will, and they likewise didn’t have in mind a teacher unqualified to train students, for they said ha`amidu, which means to stand them on their feet in truly understanding Torah, as I wrote there, and only one actually possessing truth could do this. They certainly were not speaking of arrogant individuals trying to rise to positions of power, declaring that they will rule and be powerful leaders of the people and make great academies of students, for all of their words here are words of righteousness and humility. But they did enjoin someone who is able to train many students to do so.
This is similar to the passage (Avodah Zarah 19b): “And numerous are her slain” (Proverbs 7:26)—this refers to a student who has matured to the point of deciding legal questions and does not do so. But one who has not arrived at that point and lords himself over others as mentioned earlier is included in “she has felled many dead” (Proverbs 7:26; Talmud ibid.). And if this is true of an inept legal decision, which usually only has consequences for the moment and only happens periodically and with relatively few people, all the more so in the case of a teacher who instructs numerous students every day, especially as the students then absorb the erroneous material for good. Of him it is most certainly said “she has felled many dead.”
And there is nothing objectionable about phrasing their teaching as “train many students,” with no added specifications of quality about student or teacher, for this and cases like this are an example of the verse: Straight are the ways of G-d; the righteous walk in them and sinners stumble over them (Hosea 14:10).²⁸I.e., righteous people will understand on their own that the teacher and student must possess certain requisite qualities.
What Rav writes, that the teacher must teach without charge, is clear from Nedarim, 4:3. And although it is evident from that very mishna that one may, in fact, charge for teaching just Bible verses,²⁹See the Rav ad loc., s.v. But not. the tanna was mainly enjoining one to get a teacher of Mishna and Talmud for himself, because while it is good to learn Bible verses, it is not always the most commendable thing, as the Talmud says in Bava Metzia, 33a.

AND NOT AT THE HEAD OF FOXES. Lions seem appropriate for the first part of the parable, as they are the most honorable of and rule over all the animals, and possess great strength and courage; they appropriately stand for the great and famous men, who possess the great strength it takes to bear the yoke of the Torah. Foxes, however, do not seem as appropriate. There are certainly lesser animals, so why use them in the parable?
Midrash Shmuel writes in the name of R. Yehuda Lerma that the parable conveys that one should not be lazy and abandon the study of wisdom to the point that he must get his victories through cunning and trickery—for example, by mocking a colleague and thereby causing him to fumble his arguments and other such tricks. For such a one is like the foxes, who must be victorious over the other animals through their cunning because of their lack of strength.
I say that “at the head of foxes” is discussing people who have not yet learned enough to answer legal questions, of whom the verse says “she has felled many dead” (Proverbs 7:26).¹⁷³This is the Talmud’s reading of the verse in Avodah Zarah 19b. They are likened to foxes, for when they decide to occupy the seat of judgment and they wish for people to accept their rulings they must engage in cunning and trickery and fool people.¹⁷⁴Who would not accept them based on the true level of their learning. And the mishna says “at the head of foxes”¹⁷⁵And not just “do not be one of the foxes”. According to Tosafot Yom Tov, the mishna is warning against assuming the position of judge or decisor when one is actually not ready for it. Why, then, does it warn specifically against being “at the head of foxes”? Being one of the foxes is itself the problem. to teach that even if one sees many unqualified people issuing legal decisions and knows that he is a greater scholar than they, i.e. “at their head”, he should not be envious of these sinful people.¹⁷⁶That is, he should not be envious of them because he thinks of himself as being at their head and yet does not have a position. They are unworthy of issuing rulings and their positions were gotten by dishonest means, so he shouldn’t take them into account at all. And I say of them what King Solmon said: “Catch us the foxes, the little foxes destroying the vineyards, for our vineyard is in blossom” (Song of Songs 2:15)—the vineyard being the vineyard of the Lord of Hosts, which is the gathering of the Sages, as I write on the mishna in Eduyot 2:4 which mentions “the vineyard of Yavneh”.¹⁷⁷These were the Sages of Yavneh, called Jamnia in non-Hebrew sources. Seforno on Song of Songs comments that the foxes in question are those who pretend to be scholars.
I subsequently found that Rambam in Hilchot Talmud Torah 5:4 quotes the abovementioned reading of the verse “she has felled many dead” as referring to insufficiently learned students who decide legal questions and then adds: and of them Solomon said in his wisdom, “catch us the foxes, the little foxes destroying the vinyeards”—i.e., the vineyards of the Lord of Hosts. It pleased me that I was able to arrive at the conclusion that someone as great as he had arrived at previously.

"to foxes": Even as there are lesser animals than them, he chose to make a metaphor with them, as King Shlomo, peace be upon him, compared one who has not yet reached [the level] to make legal decisions to foxes when he said, "Take for us the foxes, etc. that destroy the vineyards" - [which is referring to] the vineyard of the Lord of Hosts; about [such scholars] it is stated, "she has felled many corpses," as was stated by Rambam. And it is impossible [for him] to sit in the seat of judgment and be accepted as a decisor, unless [he will resort] to tricks and machinations to fool the people. And that is why it said, even if you see many legal decisors like this and you are the head and more important than them, do not be jealous of these sinners to be[come] like them. And see Tosafot Yom Tov.