PETER J. HAAS

I do not wish to pursue the implications of this aspect of the literature at this point. I want instead to look at what it says about the nature of the elderly, in whose name the literature comes. Let me

hasten to say that I do not mean to imply that the elderly are always

| regarded as sectarian. Nonetheless, I think there is some significance in the fact that the wisdom acquired by the aged is deemed normative and instructive alongside the written Torah and the deductions of philosophers. The form of this literature assumes that the aged are a special resource, one that deserves its own voice in our community.

What gives the elderly this special call of authority? I would | like to offer a couple of suggestions. One has to do with the concept of oral tradition. As a religion we have never regarded Tanach as a closed literary canon in the way the Church, for example, has regarded the Bible . For us, the lessons of Judaism are also always passed down from parent, and grandparent, to child. This is the point of the

midrash about Jacob and his children with which I opened this paper. This is what makes conversion to Judaism so difficult: conversion is 10t just a matter of learning Jewish history, customs, and ceremonies. | It means the absorption of an entire culture, much of which is not | articulated or written down(although this is changing). In all events, the elderly are the repository of that part of Judaism that they inherited from their parents and grandparents and are the only source | for the succeeding generations.

Second, I think the notion of ethical wills builds on the Notion of the strong Jewish family. It is inconceivable in Judaism to | have a call as we find in the New Testament to leave one’s family in order to be saved. Through the existence of ethical wills we are %aying, in effect, that the passing generations are integral to our own lives as Jews . They have an insight into what it means to live as a Jew

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