THE MENORAH AND THE TWO TABLETS

QUESTION:

May I trouble you to ask whether you have ever written a responsum on the placing of the seven-branched menorah and the tablets of the Ten Commandments in synagogues? (From Dr. Joseph Gutmann, Cincinnati, Ohio.)

ANSWER:

As FOR THE menorah, I have dealt with it rather fully. You will find the discussion in Volume II of Reform Jewish Practice, from page 20 to page 27, especially on pages 24 and 25, in which the various legal discussions about the menorah in the synagogue are cited. As for the two tablets of stone in the synagogue, I have never discussed the subject, perhaps because there is almost a complete lack of material. But I will mention what material there is, as far as I can discover.

First let me dispose of a misleading reference. In the Talmud, in Megilah 32a, there is the following: The tablets and the platforms do not have sanctity (haluchot vehabimot) . This would seem to be a clear reference to the tablets of the law in the synagogue as far back as Talmudic times. But, alas, the reference is a disappointment. You will note that Rashi says he does not know what luchot means. That statement in itself is a puzzle, for the word seems clear. Then he guesses that it might mean “book covers.” The Tosfot disagrees and seems to believe that it means the open spaces on the scroll. Maimonides (Hil. Sefer Torah, X, 4) believes it means the slates on which lessons are written for children. The Rabed to the passage thinks it means a flat platform on which the reader of the Haftorah stands. All this disagreement indicates a complete confusion. Interestingly enough, the Shulchan Aruch, Orach Chayim 154:7, quoting the Talmudic passage omits the word luchot altogether. Kraus in his Synagogale Altertume, page 388, says that the text in the Talmud is an erroneous reading and concludes that the passage must mean “the platform and the ark” (i.e., the same as the Rabed).

I went through all the codes and could not find a single reference to the use of the two tablets in the synagogue building. I wondered whether I had overlooked some reference until I noted that Abrahams, in his article on the decalogue in art (in Kohler Festschrift, p. 39 ff.), likewise states that it is not mentioned in any of the codes.

This negative fact is in itself informative. The codes do mention paintings and sculpture of various kinds in the synagogue building (lions on the Ark; verses painted on the walls, etc.) and they could naturally mention a painting or a sculpture of the two tablets of stone. If they do not mention it, it is evident that the use of this symbol was rare at the very best. Abrahams theorizes that it was not widespread till the seventeenth century.

Now there is a full discussion of the matter in the second book of Kraus on the synagogue, Korot Bate Hatfilla, New York, 1953. On pp. 237-38, he gives whatever material is available, but I must tell you that the reference to the responsum by Solomon ben Aderet is an incorrect one (IV, #285); at least it is not in my Vilna edition. If the library has the older edition (Salonica, 1803) please send me a photostat of the responsum. At all events, I will look more carefully and see if I can correct the reference.

Whenever the custom of having the two tablets arose, it quickly became widespread. The modern ritual encyclopedia, Me’ir Netiv, by Solomon Ariel, Tel Aviv, 1960, ends the article “Luchot Habrit” by saying: “In all the scattered habitations of Israel it is the custom to depict the two tablets in the synagogue on the ark or upon the reader’s stand, and upon the tablets are the Ten Commandments.”

We may conclude, therefore, because of the complete lack of references in the codes that the custom was late but that it rapidly spread into a universal use.