Breaking Bad: Haftarat Bechukotai – Jeremiah 16:19-17:14

Deception can be useful – but it feeds on itself

“History does not repeat itself, but it rhymes,” Mark Twain is reputed to have said. The same is true of the Tanach.

In the middle of this week’s Haftorah, Jeremiah exclaims:

Most devious is the heart;

It is perverse: who can fathom it?

(17:9). The word rendered as “devious” in the JPS translation and “deceitful” in the UAHC version is עקב (akov). Where have we heard this before? Ah yes – the founder of our people: Jacob, or Yaakov in Hebrew. And certainly Jacob was a deceiver: just ask Laban or Isaac.  But if one wants to say “deceitful” or “devious” in Hebrew, other words are available, most prominently רמה (ramah). So the use of akov, and its clear connection to Israel, means that the Haftarah is suggesting that this represents a specific kind of deception, one of particular invidiousness yet also one that goes to the core of human personality.

After all, the tradition is chock full of instances of when deception is a positive good. Tell the bride that she is beautiful no matter what she looks like. (Ketubot 17a, following Hillel’s position). Scholars should sometimes pretend not to know some things in order not to be perceived as arrogant (Bava Metzia 23b-24a). When two people were having a dispute, the High Priest Aaron would tell each person that the other person felt heartsick and guilty, in order to get the enemies to reconcile. (Avot d’Rabbi Natan 12:3, Avot 1:12)

So what is the difference between good and bad deception? The word akov itself gives us a clue: it means not only deceptive but also “overreaching.” Akov comes from the Hebrew word for “heel” (recall that in utero Jacob grasped at Esau’s heel), so it is a sort of deception that comes from ambitious grasping. So then what is the difference between deception that overreaches and deception that does not?

Let us reconsider the example of “good” deceit from Bava Metzia, viz., the scholar who pretends to be less learned in order not to seem arrogant. All well and good, say the Sages, but strongly condemn such a scholar if he or she harbors a secret ambition to be thought of as humble. The psychology here is subtle: one might start with an effort to not seem arrogant, and have it slowly turn into an ambition to be thought humble.

In other words, the worst sort of deception – the deception thought of in our Haftarah – is self-deception. Many of the sorts of “good” deception in our tradition are dangerous precisely because of their ability to turn rotten. Someone’s attempt to become like Aaron and resolve disputes through deception can quickly convince themselves that all their attempts to deceive are for higher purposes and thus permissible; after a while, they might realize that they have simply turned into a manipulator. Someone begins by taking care not to insult a bride; after doing this for a time, they have turned into a serial and insincere flatterer. It is not that someone overreaches by using deception, but rather that the deception itself overreaches, turning in and consuming itself.

The other key word of the Haftarah gives us another clue: when such deception is “perverse”, or אנש (anosh). Other renderings translate this as “desperate,” but it is best seen as signifying “weakness” or “sickness.” Deception turns corrosive, injecting disease into a well-intentioned heart. Thus, earlier in the Haftarah, the prophet tells us, “The guilt of Judah is inscribed with a stylus of iron, engraved with a diamond point on the tablet of their hearts.” (17:1).

One way to handle this problem is to set up sharp prophylactic rules forbidding someone to start down this sometimes-slippery slope. But as we have seen, at least here, Judaism does not do this. Instead, as I have argued previously, Jewish tradition – seen by critics as excessively “legalistic” – depends less upon sharp rules and more on spiritual practices. In this case, the spiritual practice is that of a chevruta.

Chevruta is usually described as a study partner, and its use conjures up visions of traditional yeshivot, with students hunched over and fiercely debating texts. But at its best it is more than that. After all, it derives from chaver, or friend, and it is seen as a deeper relationship. I once attended a lecture by an outstanding Orthodox rabbi who introduced, in addition to his family, his chevruta.

The job of a chevruta, then, is both as a spiritual, scholarly, and personal companion, whose job it is to keep someone from moving from good to bad deception.  The great Rabbi Elimelech of Lizensk explained that one should develop a close spiritual friend and tell him or her “all of the thoughts and feelings against the holy Torah that the evil inclination causes to come into your mind and heart…You should not hold anything back due to your embarrassment.” Rabbi Elimelech argues that the mere act of confession will resist the yaitzer ha-ra: “As a result of your bringing these things from the potential to the actual through your telling them to another person, you break the power of the evil inclination, so that it cannot overcome you as it might otherwise do.” In my view, this is somewhat over-optimistic, at least in the case of deception: the chevruta must also attempt to truly judge whether the akov has gone too far and make it very clear to the deceiver that he or she has done so.

Yaakov, the original practitioner of akov, could have used a good chevruta. Because he loved Rachel so deeply, he favored and coddled young Joseph. When Joseph responds by dreaming that his brothers and father will bow down to him, Jacob is incensed and berates the boy for such a vision. (Genesis 37:10). But he had only deceived himself: he created the brat he later condemned. Haftarat Bechukotai shows us how the noble Israel, the struggler with God, is always at risk of perverting itself.