In his commentary on the Torah, Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch offers a brilliant identification of the Adi (ornament) of the Israelites about which we read in Parashat Ki Tissa: “When the people heard this evil word, they immersed themselves in mourning and no one put on his ornament” Exodus 33:4 — see also the following verses).
We quote here the beginning of Hirsch’s commentary (according to the translation of Gertrude Hirschler; see also the translation of Isaac Levy): “We are not told what ornament this was. But it is clear from the context that it was an ornament in the literal sense of the term, one that could be put on and taken off.
(Note: R Hirsch stresses this because some commentators explain the Adi mentioned here as an ornament in the allegoric sense — see for example Ralbag. T.P.). If one interprets the words MeHar Horev, “from Mount Horeb,” (v. 6) to mean that they obtained this ornament on Mount Horeb, it must have been not simply jewelry, but an ornament of a special kind.”
“We would venture the following suggestion: There is only one object that has been described for us as the national
ornament of the Jewish people; namely, Totafot, the ornament of the forehead mentioned in Exodus 13:6. Ezekiel refers to this as Pe’er i.e. ornament without additional qualifications, and it is taken off as a sign of mourning. Should we not then consider the ornament mentioned in this verse as identical with this, the sole national ornament of the Jewish people? These are the Tefillin which they received immediately upon their departure from Mitzrayim.”
Consulting Rabbi M.A. Kasher’s Torah Shelema (volume 22. Parashat Ki Tissa, Exodu. 33:4-6) one will learn that
the identification of Adi in Parashat Ki Tissa with the Tefillin— as Rabbi Hirsch “ventures to suggest” — is found
already in much earlier works, among them the Zohar, Rabbi Isaac Arama’s Akedat Yitzhak {Sha‘ar 53) and R. Abraham
Menahem Porto’s Minha Belula.
Rabbi Kasher also quotes two Yemenite sources, to which one might add the Midrash HaHefetz by R. Zekharya
ben Shlomo the Physician, which was translated from the Judeo-Arabic by Prof. Meir Havatzelet only in recent years
and was published by Mossad HaRav Rook. Midrash HaHefetz comments on Adi in Parashat Ki Tissa: Some say that these are the Tefillin.
Further on in his commentary, R. Hirsch shows how the word “Mehar Horev” must be explained if we identify
Adi as the Tefillin regarding which we were commanded when leaving Egypt. He also shows there is no contradiction and nothing redundant in the Biblical text. First we read 33:4 that the Israelites did not put on their ornaments. The next verse seems to state that they were commanded to take off their ornaments. And from verse 6 we learn that they stripped themselves of their ornaments. Various commentators irrespective of their views as to what kind of ornament the Adi was have endeavored to clarify the textual inconsistencies. Rabbi Hirsch does it in conformity with his view on the nature of the ornament.
He writes: If this ornament is indeed the Tefillin which G-d Himself had commanded them to put on, they had to have Divine sanction also for leaving it off. (Hirsch translates 33:5, “… but now leave off your ornament”). In this case
it is not at all redundant for the text to stress, by means of these repeated statements, that even before G-d had commanded them to do so, they had left off their ornament on their own initiative, out of a feeling of unworthiness. The
fact that they had divested themselves of their ornament on their own gave this act its true significance; it expressed
their realization that they had sinned.”
Had Rabbi Kasher known Rabbi Hirsch’s view on this subject, he would have mentioned it in his Torah Shelema.
He might also have cited some of R. Hirsch’s strong arguments and remarkable elucidations. ”
The Jewish Press, Friday, April 6, 2001