על הזיווג לשם ההשכלה (על לימודי היסוד) ח׳On Mating with the Preliminary Studies 8
א׳
1[39] Again, reminiscence takes the second place to memory, and so with the reminded and the rememberer. The conditions of these two resemble respectively continuous health and recovery from disease, for forgetting is a disease of memory.
ב׳
2[40] The man who is reminded must necessarily have forgotten what he remembered before. So the holy word names memory Ephraim, which by interpretation is “fruit-bearing,” while reminding or reminiscence is called in the Hebrew Manasseh, that is “from forgetfulness.”
ג׳
3[41] For it is quite true that the soul of the rememberer has the fruits of what he learned and has lost none of them, whereas the soul of the reminded comes out of forgetfulness which possessed him before he was reminded. The man of memory then is mated to a legitimate wife, memory; the forgetful man to a concubine, reminiscence, Syrian by race, boastful and arrogant, for Syria is by interpretation “loftiness.”
ד׳
4[42] This concubine has for a son, in the Hebrew, Machir, meaning with us “the father’s,” for people who recall to memory think that the father mind was the cause of their being reminded, and do not reflect that this same mind also contained the forgetfulness, for which it would not have had room, if memory were present with it.
ה׳
5[43] We read, “The sons of Manasseh were those whom the Syrian concubine bore to him, Machir, and Machir begat Gilead” (Gen. 46:20).
ו׳
6Nahor too, the brother of Abraham, has two wives, legitimate and concubine, and the name of the legitimate wife was Milcah, and the name of the concubine Reumah (Gen. 22:23, 24).
ז׳
7[44] Now let no sane man suppose that we have here in the pages of the wise legislator an historical pedigree. What we have is a revelation through symbols of facts which may be profitable to the soul. And if we translate the names into our own tongue, we shall recognize that what is here promised is actually the case. Let us inquire then into each of them.