Musar su Genesi 1:28

The commandment to be fruitful and multiply that we find in Genesis 9,7, is a repetition of the same commandment already recorded in פרשת בראשית in 1,28: "G–d said to them: "Be fruitful and multiply, etc". We have devoted considerable space to discussing that commandment in connection with the discussion in the Talmud Yevamot that failure to comply with this commandment is very serious. This commandment is obligatory for males only. Rabbi Yochanan ben Broka notes that in both instances this commandment is introduced in the Torah as a blessing, i.e. "G–d blessed them and said to them…" From this he concludes that the commandment applies equally to both men and women. The author of the Mishnah in Yevamot 65 bases his statement that only males are obligated to procreate on the fact that only males are in the habit of "conquering," and that the Torah connects the commandment with the directive to "conquer or subdue" the earth (Genesis 1,28). At any rate, both these rabbis understand the words פרו ורבו, "be fruitful and multiply," as a command. Bar Kappara in Ketuvot 5 says that the reason a widow should be married on Thursday evening is that when cohabitation takes place this will be on Friday, the day that G–d blessed mankind with the blessing to be fruitful.

The two arms of man correspond to the emanations חסד and גבורה. The two legs correspond to the emanations נצח and הוד. The male reproductive organ within which all the forces of the body coalesce and form his seed and by means of which he unites with his wife, corresponds to the emanation מלכות. After the Torah had described the union of man and wife [i.e. man in the plural i.e. אותם, Ed.], it mentions that G–d blessed them (Genesis 1,28). He called their combined name אדם. Man had not become whole until joined by his wife as a separate entity. When this occurred Man's soul wore garments of distinction [i.e. the body. Ed.] Man's essence is his "interior," his body is merely his "clothing." This "clothing" was snow white, as if he were wearing clothing made of "light," i.e. כתנות אור. Man's body then could be described as illuminating both his soul and itself. This provided man with three different kinds of wholeness or "perfections." They are alluded to in the acronym מגן (usually understood as shield, protection). The three letters forming that acronym are the first letters of each of the words ממון, money, גוף, body, and נשמה, soul. This is what is meant when the beauty of Jacob is described by our sages as comparable to the beauty of Adam. The Torah refers to it when it describes the mental and physical state of Jacob/Israel shortly after his encounter with Samael. We read in Genesis 33,18: ויבא יעקב שלם, "Jacob arrived whole." We are told in Shabbat 33b, that the word "whole" comprised the three aspects we have mentioned as the perfection of Adam. The Talmud described one of the aspects in which Jacob was "whole,” שלם, as תורתו; this refers, of course, to the state of his נשמה, his soul, since it is Torah which illuminates our soul. Adam the whole was not deficient in any area that is part of life. He did not have any needs since he already found himself at home in גן עדן, in an ideal environment. His food was derived from the trees of גן עדן. He did not have to work for a living and was therefore free to directly devote all his time to the service of G–d. The Torah describes that Adam was placed in גן עדן in order לעבדה ולשמרו, was placed in such an undemanding environment in order to enable him to serve G–d without hindrance and impediment. Our sages interpret the word לעבדה as referring to the performance of positive commandments, whereas the word לשמרה refers to the care taken not to transgress negative commandments. Adam performed all six hundred and thirteen commandments in a theoretical, spiritual fashion. All of this is explained in Pardes Rimonim chapter הנשמה, and I have elaborated on this elsewhere (מסכת חולין item 104, new edition of של"ה השלם by Rabbi Meir Katz). Man unfortunately did not even manage to spend a single night in גן עדן before he sinned. (cf. Psalms 49,13). His "jewelry" was removed as a result of his seduction by the serpent. This brought in its wake that instead of wearing "garments" which illuminated his soul as well as his body, he had to wear garments made of the hide of flesh, i.e. animals which did not represent anything spiritual. Ever since, new generations of man are the product of the smelly drop of semen, i.e. semen which is polluted by the residual pollutant of the original serpent. Once Eve had become defiled through sexual union with the serpent, the defiled party had to leave the holy site, i.e. גן עדן, just as in the desert anyone who was ritually impure could not remain within the holy precincts of the מחנה שכינה, the camp hosting the Presence of G–d. The immediate result of this was the toil involved in securing his sustenance, his clothing and his shelter. This is what the Torah meant when it describes that G–d told Adam: "You will eat bread in the sweat of your brow" (Genesis 3,19). Because man was constructed from parts of nature, מטבע, he has a tendency to pursue money, matbei'a, as symbolized by the word מטבע. He uses this money, מטבע, to secure his needs.

This portion contains a single positive commandment, the duty to be fruitful and to multiply, since the Torah says: ויברך אותם אלוקים ויאמר להם אלוקים פרו ורבו. This commandment is repeated in פרשת נח. We will discuss the commandment in detail at that point.

When the sages in the Talmud speak about the bones of such a bachelor swelling up, they take into consideration that Adam described his wife as עצם מעצמי, "a bone of my bones” (Genesis 2,23), and that man therefore is not complete until he has been paired with the remainder of his bones. Failure to do this causes damage to his bones, leaves him physically incomplete. The reason the time limit is twenty years is that at that age a Jewish man is subject to military duties, and the Torah refers to him as איש, man (Numbers 2,2 et al). The relationship between military duty and fulfillment of the commandment to be fruitful is also alluded to in Genesis 1,28 where G–d links the commandment to "be fruitful and multiply" with the command to "conquer" the earth.

The author quotes Rabbi Eliyahu Mizrachi, who addresses himself to that difficulty in his commentary on Rashi and opines that both in Genesis 1,28 and 9,1 the Torah expresses a blessing which subsequently is followed by the words פרו ורבו as a commandment. The latter statement is to be understood as an elaboration of the blessing. The actual commandment however is derived only from Genesis 9,7: ואתם פרו ורבו. This sentence does not contain a blessing and is in agreement with the statement in Sanhedrin 59.

According to this, the homiletical meaning Rashi speaks about, namely the comparison of someone who fails to carry out that commandment to a murderer as stated by Rabbi Eliezer in Yevamot 63, is based on the verse immediately prior to that in which the Torah proclaims: שופך דם האדם באדם דמו ישפך, "Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed." He apparently holds that only males are commanded to fulfil this commandment, and disagrees with Rabbi Yochanan ben Broka. The latter holds that the line "He blessed them," applied to both man and woman. The reason that the other scholar disagrees is that he holds that just as only males are in the habit of conquering, a condition in Genesis 1,28, so only males have to fulfil the condition of being fruitful. Clearly then he must hold that the words "He said to them, etc." must be understood as a commandment. The same reasoning applies to the first time the words פרו ורבו appear in Genesis 9,1. Rabbi Yochanan would then be in disagreement with Bar Kappara and the Talmud Sanhedrin 59, who both hold that the commandment is only found in Genesis 9,7, i.e. ואתם פרו ורבו. Nonetheless he interprets these verses homiletically on the basis of Rabbi Eliezer who believes that a homiletical explanation based on matters which appear side by side in the Torah is almost a commandment in itself [words are mine. Ed.]. Rabbi Eliezer bases his approach to exegesis on Psalms 111,8: סמוכים לעד לעולם, that words next to one another always, i.e. under all conditions, have an exegetical significance. Rabbi Eliezer applies that principle even when the verses in question are not "free" for homiletics but have already been explained as necessary in a different context.

Our author finds the reasoning of Rabbi Eliyahu Mizrachi very forced, and he feels that all the statements of the sages in the Talmud are totally acceptable and do not contain any internal contradictions. Before elaborating further we must be clear that the verse in Genesis 1,28 represents both a blessing and a commandment. The proof is simply the insertion of the words "G–d said to them." Why would the name of G–d appear twice in the same verse otherwise? Genesis 9,1, in which the name of G–d is not mentioned twice as a subject, is however capable of being interpreted in either direction.

We know that terrestrial man was created in the image and form of his Celestial Counterpart, אדם העליון. As soon as man and woman had been created they were commanded to procreate, to be fruitful and to multiply. We read in Genesis 1,28: ויאמר להם אלוקים פרו ורבו, meaning that they should produce other human beings similar to themselves, i.e. similar to the אדם העליון, the spiritual human prototype on the throne of G–d. G–d had, after all, created man on earth in the likeness of that prototype; if man on earth had not failed and as a result become garbed in the pollutants emitted by the serpent, there would not have been such a thing as shame, negative aspects to the act of procreation. On the contrary, the act of procreation would have been the performance of a commandment exactly like that of putting on phylacteries and other commandments performed with one's body. The semen would have been an emission originating in the brain, and the person born as a result of such an emission would have come into the world with the same stature as Adam. In spite of what may be valid amongst the Gentile nations, Israel -because it is holy- needs to sanctify itself prior to engaging in the act of procreation as we have explained on pages 22, 39, and elsewhere.

I believe that I can add another dimension to the understanding of this מדרש, and to relate it to the commandment of פריה ורביה, the duty to procreate. I also mean to explain why the Talmud (Megillah 27) says that the only reason one is allowed to sell a Torah scroll is to enable one to fulfill the commandment to get married and to beget children. The Talmud there simply says that the reason for this is the verse in Isaiah 45,18: "He did not create it to be a waste, but formed it for habitation." why does the Talmud not quote the commandment from the Torah which is very specific, and is content to quote an indirect reference from the prophets? The same question can be raised against a statement in Chagigah 2b, where the Talmud also denies a person who is partially a slave and partially free the right not to marry by citing the above verse in Isaiah as its reason. Tosaphot, in addressing themselves to that problem, come to the conclusion that the statement in Isaiah is more compelling than the commandment פרו ורבו. No explanation is offered why this should be so.