Kedoshim 5768

Parashat Kedoshim 5/3/08

 

Vayikra 19:14 “... lifnei iver lo titen michshol” – Before a blind person do not place a stumbling block.

 

What’s a michshol? Virtually all English translations render the word as “stumbling block”. The implication of the verse appears to be that one should not place an object in the path of a walking blind person, so as to cause that person to trip and fall.

 

But “stumbling block” doesn’t quite capture the meaning of michshol. If we delve a little further into the true meaning of the word, we may derive a deeper understanding of the meaning of the mitzvah “lifnei iver lo titen michshol”.

 

Michshol is a derived noun from the root “Kaf-Shin-Lamed”. According to Friedrich Wilhelm Genesius’s Hebrew and Chaldee Lexicon (1846), “Kaf-Shin-Lamed” means “to waver, to totter, to stagger. It differs from its synonyms “Bet-Resh-Ayin” and “Kaf-Nun-Ayin”, in that our root signifies to totter in the ankles.