<blockquote lang=he><p><b>פט</b> לעולם ה׳ דברך נצב בשמים׃<br/> <b>צ</b> לדר ודר אמונתך; כוננת ארץ ותעמד׃<br/> <b>צא</b> למשפטיך עמדו היום; כי הכל עבדיך׃</p> <footer class=source>תהילים פרק קיט</footer></blockquote> We've talked about Torah as the "blueprint" of the created world. There's another idea here, of לעולם ה׳ דברך נצב בשמים, that Torah exists as a sort of Heavenly ideal, the Platonic form of Torah. What we learn is only a shadow. But in a reversal of Plato's ideas, it is the "shadow" that is real: <blockquote lang=he><p>קא מיפלגי במתיבתא דרקיעא: אם בהרת קודמת לשער לבן טמא ;ואם שער לבן קודם לבהרת טהור. ספק, הקב"ה אומר טהור, וכולהו מתיבתא דרקיעא אמרי טמא. ואמרי מאן נוכח? נוכח רבה בר נחמני.</p> <footer class=source>בבא מציעא פו,א</footer></blockquote> <blockquote lang=en><p>The halakhic order comprises three distinct tiers. There is, first, an ideal, and presumably monistic, plane, the Torah which is <i lang=he>ba-shamayyim</i>...There is, as the final stage, the definitive corpus, the genre of the <i lang=he>Shulhan Arukh</i>, which, having decided among various views, posits—again, monistically—what is demanded of the Jew. Intermediately, however, there is the vibrant and entrancing world within which exegetical debate and analytic controversy are the order of the day, and within which divergent and even contradictory views are equally accredited. [T]he results all attain the status of Torah, as a tenable variant reading of <i lang=he>devar Hashem</i>: “Both these and those are words of the living God.”</p> <footer class=source><a href="https://www.lookstein.org/professional-dev/human-social-factor-halakha/">Rav Aharon Lichtenstein, <cite>The Human and Social Factor in Halakha</cite></a></footer></blockquote> דברך נצב בשמים but it is דר ודר אמונתך, the generations of humanity, that כוננת ארץ ותעמד. (We've cited this idea <a href="/Word+of+Mouth">before</a>, in discussing how the <i lang=el>nomos</i> of Torah helps us understand the narrative of ספר שמואל) Then David turns to the physical world, that *must* obey G-d's rules, what Rav Hutner called רצון-מתן-הכרח דמאמרות, the imperative will of G-d that is implied in the עשרה מאמרות of creation: <blockquote lang=he><p> <em>למשפטיך עמדו היום</em>: ר״ל בכל יום ויום עומדים מערכת השמים וכסיליהם לעשות משפטיך כפי הגזר... </p> <footer class=source>מצודת דוד, תהלים קיט:צא</footer></blockquote> <hr/> And then David turns back to himself: <blockquote lang=he><p><b>צב</b> לולי תורתך שעשעי אז אבדתי בעניי׃<br/> <b>צג</b> לעולם לא אשכח פקודיך; כי בם חייתני׃<br/> <b>צד</b> לך אני הושיעני; כי פקודיך דרשתי׃<br/> <b>צה</b> לי קוו רשעים לאבדני; עדתיך אתבונן׃<br/> <b>צו</b> לכל תכלה ראיתי קץ; רחבה מצותך מאד׃</p> <footer class=source>תהילים פרק קיט</footer></blockquote> For this stich, I want to start focusing on one of the terms David uses. As we've noted, each pasuk in this perek has a synonym for Torah: <blockquote lang=he><p>המזמור הזה הוא נכבד מאד וחברו דוד על שמונה אל״ף בית כי בכל אות יש בו שמנה פסוקים ובכל פסוק יש בו דרך, או תורה, או עדות, או פקודים, או מצוה, או אמירה, או דבור, או משפט, או צדק, או אמונה, או חוקים, ואלה המלות הם חלוקי כל התורה.</p> <footer class=source>רד״ק, תהילים קיט:א</footer></blockquote> Here we have the term פְּקוּדָה used twice. What's interesting about that word is that it is unique to תהילים. In the rest of תנ״ך, the root פקד means "count" or "appoint"; a person can have a פְּקוּדָה but it implies a role rather than a specific command: <blockquote lang=he><p> ויאמר ה׳ אל משה פקד כל בכר זכר לבני ישראל מבן חדש ומעלה; ושא את מספר שמתם׃</p> <footer class=source>במדבר ג:מ</footer></blockquote> <blockquote lang=he><p>ופקדת אלעזר בן אהרן הכהן שמן המאור וקטרת הסמים ומנחת התמיד ושמן המשחה; פקדת כל המשכן וכל אשר בו בקדש ובכליו׃</p> <footer class=source>במדבר ד:טז</footer></blockquote> It's not a very different meaning, but it is different. In Aramaic, however, פקד explicitly means "command": <blockquote lang=he><p>ויצו ה׳ אלקים על האדם לאמר; מכל עץ הגן אכל תאכל׃</p> <footer class=source>בראשית ב:טז </footer></blockquote> <blockquote lang=he><p><em>ופקיד</em> ה׳ אלקים על אדם למימר מכל אילן גנתא מיכל תיכול </p> <footer class=source>תרגום אונקלוס, שם </footer></blockquote> So is it a loan word from the Aramaic? The academics certainly think so: <blockquote lang=en><p>Avi Hurvitz of the Hebrew University has made the case for Psalm 119’s late date in his book entitled בין לשון ללשון (literally, “between [one] language and [another] language”), which establishes firm criteria for identifying Late Biblical Hebrew (the post-exilic phase of Hebrew within the biblical corpus) and distinguishing it from the classical language.</p> ... <p>Based on context, the word <i lang=he>piqqudekha</i> (“Your precepts”) in verses 45 and 94 is a synonym for commandments. Unlike other, more common words (such as <i lang=he>tora</i> or <i lang=he>mitsva</i>), however, this word occurs only in the Book of Psalms. In the rest of the Hebrew Bible, the root p-q-d (source of the word <i lang=he>piqqudekha</i>) refers to counting or appointing, rather than to commanding. The use of the root in the semantic sphere of commanding occurs in post-biblical Hebrew literature, probably under the influence of Aramaic, where p-q-d typically refers to commands. The word <i lang=he>piqqudekha</i> in Psalm 119 shows this same Aramaic influence, which most likely occurred during the exile, so Hurvitz considers this word to be a linguistic marker of the psalm’s post-exilic date.</p> <footer class=source><a href="https://thetorah.com/seeking-torah-god/">Professor Shalom Holtz, <cite>Seeking Torah, Seeking G-d: Psalm 119</cite></a></footer></blockquote> I'm skeptical of this kind of analysis. Loan words don't imply conquest; the Malaysians never took over the US: <blockquote lang=en><dl> <dt>ketchup (n.)</dt> <dd>1711, said to be from Malay (Austronesian) kichap, but probably not original to Malay. It might have come from Chinese koechiap "brine of fish," which, if authentic, perhaps is from the Chinese community in northern Vietnam [Terrien de Lacouperie, in "Babylonian and Oriental Record," 1889, 1890]. Catsup (earlier catchup, 1680s) is a failed attempt at Englishing, still in use in U.S., influenced by cat and sup.</dd> <dd>Originally a fish sauce made from various plant juices, the word came to be used in English for a wide variety of spiced gravies and sauces; "Apicius Redivivus; or, the Cook's Oracle," by William Kitchiner, London, 1817, devotes 7 pages to recipes for different types of catsup (his book has 1 spelling of ketchup, 72 of catsup), including walnut, mushroom, oyster, cockle and mussel, tomata, white (vinegar and anchovies figure in it), cucumber, and pudding catsup. Chambers's Encyclopaedia (1870) lists mushroom, walnut, and tomato ketchup as "the three most esteemed kinds." Tomato ketchup emerged c. 1800 in U.S. and predominated from early 20c.</dd> </dl> <footer class=source><a href="https://www.etymonline.com/word/ketchup">Online Etymological Dictionary, <cite>ketchup</cite></a></footer></blockquote> Also, the word פקודיך appears in perakim explicitly attributed to David: <blockquote lang=he><p><b>א</b> למנצח מזמור לדוד׃<br/> ... <b>ט</b> פקודי ה׳ ישרים משמחי לב; מצות ה׳ ברה מאירת עינים׃</p> <footer class=source>תהילים פרק יט</footer></blockquote> So I would assume that תהילים קיט was written by David, and that he coined the word פְּקוּדָה as a synonym for מצוה. Maybe he was influenced by the Aramaic, but Hebrew and Aramaic cultures have been interacting since time immemorial. <blockquote lang=he><p>ויקרא לו לבן יגר שהדותא; ויעקב קרא לו גלעד׃</p> <footer class=source>בראשית לא:מז</footer></blockquote> <hr/> But what exactly does פקודיך mean? We could read it as just another synonym for מצותיך, but the Malbim (as is his wont) understands it more sharply, making a fine distinction: מצות are the commandments and פקודים are the details: <blockquote lang=he><p>ומצות הם מצות התורה בכלל...והפקודים הם מצות שמופקד בם לזכר ענינים פרטים.</p> <footer class=source>מלבי״ם, ביאור המילות תהלים קיט:א </footer></blockquote> It's not clear where he gets this from, but Professor Holtz points out another innovation of this perek: the idea of מדרש. David says, פקודיך דרשתי. In the Torah (and most of the rest of תנ״ך), דרש means to seek out and is applied to ה׳ (or other powers): <blockquote lang=he><p> כי אם אל המקום אשר יבחר ה׳ אלקיכם מכל שבטיכם לשום את שמו שם; לשכנו תדרשו ובאת שמה:</p> <footer class=source>דברים יב:ה</footer></blockquote> <blockquote lang=he><p> דרשו ה׳ בהמצאו; קראהו בהיותו קרוב׃</p> <footer class=source>ישעיהו נה:ו</footer></blockquote> <blockquote lang=he><p>וחבר חבר; ושאל אוב וידעני ודרש אל המתים׃</p> <footer class=source>דברים יח:יא</footer></blockquote> Or it means to investigate: <blockquote lang=he><p> ודרשת וחקרת ושאלת היטב; והנה אמת נכון הדבר נעשתה התועבה הזאת בקרבך׃</p> <footer class=source>דברים יג:טו</footer></blockquote> <blockquote lang=he><p> ואת שעיר החטאת דרש דרש משה והנה שרף; ויקצף על אלעזר ועל איתמר בני אהרן הנותרם לאמר׃</p> <footer class=source>ויקרא י:טז</footer></blockquote> But it's only here that דרישה is applied to the Torah. It seems to be a blend of "seeking" and "investigating". <blockquote lang=en><p>Similarly, the semantics of the root <i lang=he>d-r-sh</i>...in these verses also exemplify Late Biblical Hebrew. In the rest of the Hebrew Bible, when the root refers to some aspect of the religious experience, the object of the verb often refers to G-d (or another god) or G-d’s word. Biblical verses in which the object of the verb refers to G-d’s commandments, rather than God or God’s word, occur only in Psalm 119 and in the Books of Ezra (7:10) and I Chronicles (28:8). -This usage is familiar to any student of rabbinic literature, where the object of <i lang=he>midrash</i>...is the biblical text.</p> <footer class=source><a href="https://thetorah.com/seeking-torah-god/">Professor Shalom Holtz, <cite>Seeking Torah, Seeking G-d: Psalm 119</cite></a></footer></blockquote> His other examples are, interestingly, a quote from David himself: <blockquote lang=he><p>ועתה לעיני כל ישראל קהל ה׳ ובאזני אלקינו שמרו ו<em>דרשו כל מצות ה׳ אלקיכם</em> למען תירשו את הארץ הטובה והנחלתם לבניכם אחריכם עד עולם׃ </p> <footer class=source>דברי הימים א כח:ח</footer></blockquote> And Ezra: <blockquote lang=he><p>כי עזרא הכין לבבו ל<em>דרש את תורת ה׳</em> ולעשת וללמד בישראל חק ומשפט׃</p> <footer class=source>עזרא ז:י</footer></blockquote> Now, Holtz uses that fact to argue that our perek must be late, from the time of Ezra, but I would argue the opposite. This is part of David's expression of what תלמוד תורה means, that <i lang=yi>darshening</i> is an inherent part of how we relate to the mind of G-d. As Malbim says, הפקודים הם...לזכר ענינים פרטים. <blockquote lang=en><p>G-d is in the details.</p> <footer class=source><a href="https://www.forbes.com/quotes/6185/">Ludwig Mies van der Rohe</a> (<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1989/07/30/magazine/on-language-who-s-in-those-details.html">maybe</a>)</footer></blockquote>