When Maimonides laid out his view of how we can understand God, his emphasis was on limitations: we cannot affirmatively say what God is, but we can describe God through the actions that God performs in the world. Those help us understand what God is, even if we are still distanced from how we describe God’s essence. But when the Hebrew Bible does speak of God’s actions, it inevitably uses human language. God performs different movements that to the uninformed reader might come across as unmistakably human— but this is simply done because the text itself will be read by humans. And the only way we can understand the world is through our own human framework.
The actions that God does perform set a kind of moral standard for us: just as God does x, so should humans do x. Even if we can only access God through the mediation of the text, the text can still be instructive to us. We learn from God’s behavior and act to imitate it.
But when the Rabbis try to understand a verse that comes right before this week’s parasha, they flip this on its head.1 If traditionally, humans aim for imitatio Dei, the Rabbi suggest that God engages in imitatio humane (I never took Latin, so please alert me if Google Translate let me astray). In this radical idea, God learns from humans, and we can actually only understand God in the world through studying the acts of humanity.
The Rabbis focus on the pithy descriptor: הָאֵל֙ הַֽנֶּאֱמָ֔ן, the faithful/steadfast God (Deuteronomy 7:9).
This is a familiar line that pops up repeatedly in the liturgy and is a compelling idea: God has faith. But when pauses and considers, it becomes unclear what this actually means. We associate faith with a leap: one does not know axiomatically, but one believes. Faith is the tether between the human and the unconfirmed ideal. Uncertainty is built into faith or it would be something else entirely. What does it mean then to have an uncertain God?
The Rabbis anticipate Maimonides but take a modified approach:
“From the faithfulness of humans, you can learn about the faithfulness of the Holy Blessed One.” (Dvarim Rabbah 3:3)
The Rabbis don’t operate in the world of philosophical definitions and abstractions and thus aim to define what “faith” is. Rather, they describe what faith looks like in practice. But whereas traditionally, we learn how to act from God’s example, here it is the reverse: God seems to learn from us. Or at the very least, we are able to understand what it means for God to be faithful through an examination of human behavior.
To flesh this out, the Rabbis turn to one of the great unsung Rabbinic heroes, Rabbi Pinchas Ben Yair. In separate stories, Pinchas Ben Yair embodies faithfulness that can then help us understand God.
There is a story of Rabbi Pinchas Ben Yair who was living in a city in the south. A group of people went there in order to make a living. They brought with them two measures of barley and left them there with him. They forgot about the barley and moved on from that town. Rabbi Pinchas Ben Yair planted them each year and harvested and stored them. After seven years, the group of people returned to that city in the South to search for their barley. Immediately, Pinchas Ben Yair recognized them and said to them, “come and take from your storehouse.” Here from the faithfulness of humans, you can learn the faithfulness of God. (Dvarim Rabbah 3:3)
In this account, Rabbi Pinchas Ben Yair encounters migrants who come to make a living. We learn nothing about them, whether they are Jewish or not or where they have come from. We just get the facts that they arrive from an unknown place to the one where Pinchas Ben Yair lives. Pinchas Ben Yair somehow makes their acquaintance and earns their trust to hold on to the barley that they bring with them. Some circumstances drive them away. Instead of simply holding on to what they left with him, Pinchas Ben Yair sets to work. Every year, he harvests; every year, he stores. He does not aim to convert his labor into capital for personal gain. He knows that the barley has been left with him for safekeeping.
Eventually, the original owners return in search of their barley. Pinchas Ben Yair could have donned a disguise and hid from them. He had labored for seven years and one could be sympathetic to a desire to hold on to what he had produced. Yet, he recognizes them and actively seeks them out. Rather than invite them into his home, he encourages them to take from “your storehouses.” He does not see himself as an owner but rather a caretaker of the goods of others.
The Rabbis bring back their refrain: human faithfulness is where we learn about God’s faithfulness. Pinchas Ben Yair sees an example ripe for divine imitation.
In the next story, we see Pinchas Ben Yair engaged in other acts of faithfulness:
Another story of Rabbi Pinchas ben Yair. He went to a city, and there were mice eating from the vicinity. People came and asked for his help. What did Rabbi Pinchas Ben Yair do? He said to them, “why are you not separating your tithes as you are supposed to? Do you want me to be a guarantor/שֶׁנַּעֲרֹב for you that if your tithe properly, mice will no longer eat your grain?” The people responded, “Yes.” Rabbi Pinchas Ben Yair promised them, and the mice went away.
In this story, Pinchas Ben Yair comes to a city ravaged by mice infestation. He surmises that the people there have not been tithing properly and uses the peculiar language of guarantorship. This language appears most famously as a description of Jewish mutual responsibility: all of Israel are guarantors for each other. In its context, it speaks about how one Jew is responsible for the moral behavior of other Jews and has an obligation to give them tochecha, corrective feedback. This powerful phrasing has been used to inspire Jews for generations to look out for each other. Guarantorship also functions in the context of contractual agreements: a guarantor affirms the stability of a contract. If I don’t fulfill my part of the bargain, you can go to my guarantor to uphold it.
So what is it doing here? The people seem to doubt the necessity and efficacy of tithing. And yet, divine punishment is at play because the people are not following through with their ritual obligations.
It is unclear what it actually means for Pinchas Ben Yair to be a guarantor here. The implication might be that if the people do tithe, but the mice continue to eat their food, he will be responsible for that food. Pinchas Ben Yair is motivated by faith in the divine system: that if people act in correct ways, they will be summarily rewarded. But he also has a pastoral faith. He could just reprimand the people and tell them to behave properly. Instead of stopping there, he gives them a guarantee to support them when they lack faith.
“Don’t believe in God,” he seems to state, “well, you can believe in me.” He meets the people where they are, their behavior changes, and their circumstances follow.
One can read the story of divine punishment and reward— but one can also consider the possibility that tithing led them to develop better storing practices, keeping their precious food away from ravenous mice. In either case, it is the faithfulness of Pinchas Ben Yair that gets them there.
At the end of the midrash, we don’t walk away with a definition of faithfulness. And we still cannot say precisely what it means to speak of הָאֵל֙ הַֽנֶּאֱמָ֔ן, the faithful God. But Pinchas Ben Yair’s behavior gives us a template: faithfulness is rooted in an interpersonal obligation. Whether it is to look after the belongings of strangers or encourage people when they have a crisis of faith, faithfulness is about our ability to show up for others. When we speak of הָאֵל֙ הַֽנֶּאֱמָ֔ן, the faithful God in prayer, we should be reminded that we have the opportunity to set an example for all to follow, divine or human.
Why this Midrash is in the Ekev chapter of Dvarim Rabbah is unclear. Presumably, there is a link between the other Midrashim that focus on the word עֵ֣קֶב/ekev which speak to the guarantees of what will happen “consequently” or “in the end” and the faithfulness of God.