A Torah Thought

[rosends]

I wanted to share a short Torah idea developed by a bunch of students with whom I was working.

In Parshat Lech L'cha, Hashem promises to Avram (in Ber.12:3) וַאֲבָֽרֲכָה֙ מְבָ֣רְכֶ֔יךָ וּמְקַלֶּלְךָ֖ אָאֹ֑ר [I will bless those who bless you And curse him that curses you]. This, in and of itself is not so remarkable. But I asked my students, why did the language of "curse" change halfway through, going fro the k-l-l root to the a-r-r root?

I had searched through a bunch of meforshim and most who dealt with this section asked about the inversion of the words between the two parts ("I will bless those who bless you and those who curse you I will curse") -- a sort of chiasmus. None seemed to deal with the thinking behind not keeping the same word for curse.

The only thing I could contribute to a reason related to a passing statement I found in the Pnei David (Rabbi Chaim Yosef David Azulay - the Chida.), "כי הנה ארירה יותר מקללה". He is speaking about cursing in thought vs. action (I think) but he says that the language of a-r-r is "more" than k-l-l. So my gut reaction, and I explained this to the students, was that Hashem's promise was that any curse would be revisited larger upon the perpetrators. A small curse on the Children of Israel will boomerang into a larger curse on the one who thought it.

Then a student asked about the particular form (first person, future) of that a-r-r verb. He said that a'or (aleph, aleph, reish) looked like a similar construction for "I will light up." I didn't have my lu'ach of roots and conjugations on e but I agreed that they did look similar. So another student pointed out that any secret curse would be compounded by having it exposed to the public. The students decided that one of the ways that a sin would be turned on to those who curse Israel would be by not letting them hide their hatred. Shining the harsh light of truth on it and making it obvious and public would certainly be a larger punishment than just serving a curse back, measure for measure. Therefore, they said, the choice of the second curse word was a necessary one to show the added dimension of God's promise, one thought would be absent were the k-l-l root be used.

While there are additional steps one should do before simply accepting this reading (such as checking grammatical texts and looking at other uses of the a-r-r root and seeing how this idea might or might not fit in) I am happy that a bunch of HS students were able to innovate this reading (and that I haven't found it obviously in other places yet).

 

[Tumah]

That's a very interesting thought. The Chid"a is explaining that the rule of combining thoughts to actions would apply in this case (and he uses that as a question against the Kli Yakar). ארר is stronger than קלל because the punishment is reprisal for sin in both thought and action.

It could be that this can tie in somewhat to the Malbi"m's explanation of the two words. He explains the difference between ארר and קלל, is that קלל is the "curse" while ארר is the deficiency in the subject caused by the curse. That's why whenever G-d curses man it always (with one exception) uses the ארר version - G-d's curses are always effective. When man curses (_) G-d, it always uses the word קלל because it's never effective. So קלל is cursing in thought or word while ארר is manifested.

I think the אאר - אאור connections is possible, although I think the word meaning "I will light up" is אאיר from the verb מאיר rather than the noun אור. But maybe על דרך הדרוש you can translate it "[for those that curse you], I will be [as] a light" that brings their sin to light.
I also found this book whose author suggests that the Torah will use the same word to mean a thing and it's negative like קדושה and קדֵשה (harlot). I would have liked to have seen some more examples to prove the point, but maybe he's right. I looked through everything I have and couldn't find anything else but there's got to be something. There's no way no one makes such a connection. The only other thing I found was the B'nei Yisaschar saying that אאור comes from אורה which is the word for "harvest" when talking about dates.

All in all, I think it's a very nice thought and especially nice to see engaged HS students.

 

[Jayhawker Soule]

Alter, in his The Five Books of Moses, offers:

I will bless those who bless you, and those who damn you I will curse.
​

Similarly, Richard Elliott Friedman suggests:

And I'll bless those who bless you, and those who affront you I'll curse.​

Nahum Sarna, in the JPS Torah Commentary: Genesis, notes:

The verb k-l-l, referring to the offender's action, means "to disparage, abuse, cause, harm"; '-r-r, referring to God's response, has the much stronger connotation of "to place under a ban, to deprive of the benefits of divine provenance," and it is the only term employed in curse formulas.​