Pensamento Judaico sobre Êxodo 22:5

But to resume. Should those of our co-religionists—and it is of them alone that I speak—who imitate the followers of other religions, maintain that when they torment their bodies, and renounce every joy, that they do so merely to discipline the faculties of their souls by inclining somewhat to the one extreme, as is proper, and in accordance with our own recommendations in this chapter, our answer is that they are in error, as I shall now demonstrate. The Law did not lay down its prohibitions, or enjoin its commandments, except for just this purpose, namely, that by its disciplinary effects we may persistently maintain the proper distance from either extreme. For, the restrictions regarding all the forbidden foods, the prohibitions of illicit intercourse, the fore-warning against prostitution, the duty of performing the legal marriage-rites which, nevertheless, does not permit intercourse at all times, as, for instance, during the period of menstruation, and after child-birth, besides its being otherwise restricted by our sages, and entirely interdicted during the daytime, as we have explained in the Tractate Sanhedrin—all of these God commanded in order that we should keep entirely distant from the extreme of the inordinate indulgence of the passions, and, even departing from the exact medium, should incline somewhat towards self-denial, so that there may be firmly rooted in our souls the disposition for moderation.³⁴Cf. Moreh, III, 35, and H. Deot, III.

Yaẓa (“he came out”) is the opposite of ba (“he came in”). The term yaẓa is applied to the motion of a body from a place in which it had previously rested, to another place (whether the body be a living being or not), e.g., “And when they were gone out (yaẓeü) if the city” (Gen. 44:4); “If fire break out (teẓe)” (Exod. xxii. .5). It was then figuratively employed to denote the appearance of something incorporeal, as, “The word went out (yaẓa) of the king’s mouth” (Esth. 7:8); “When this deed of the queen shall come abroad (yeẓe) unto all women” (Esth. 1:17), that is to say, “the report will spread.” Again, “For out of Zion shall go forth (teẓe) the Law” (Isa. 2:3); further, “The sun had risen (yaẓa) upon the earth” (Gen. 19:23), i.e., its light became visible.