What is the connection between משל (parable) and מושל (ruler)?

QUESTION: Dear R’ Klein,

I hope all is going well with you. I’m wondering if you have seen anything about the word משל, parable, and particularly if there is any linguistic link to the word מושל, rulership or power.

Thanks for all your Torah, and have a freihlechen Adar!

Best,

Yehuda Fogel

6 answers0 replies

6 Comments

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Aug 11, 2023

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bcsk724

Aug 08, 2023

There appears to be an interesting linguistic connection between the Hebrew words "משל" (mashal) meaning "parable" and "מושל" (moshel) meaning "ruler" or "one who rules/governs."

Though they come from different roots, there is likely some shared semantic link between the ideas of "parable" and "ruler." A few potential connections:

- A parable teaches a lesson about proper conduct, values, wisdom - similar to how a ruler or governor provides leadership and guidance to the people.

- The messages conveyed through parables can shape people's perspectives and actions. Likewise, a ruler's decrees and policies directly influence the population.

- Parables have authority as a trusted source of truth and moral instruction. A ruler also possesses authority to make judgments and command the populace.

- Just as a parable draws comparisons using metaphors, a ruler makes judgments by drawing comparisons between policies, laws, ideas etc.

- The style of communicating lessons through parables is comparable to how rulers would communicate edicts and pronouncements to the public.

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So while they have distinct meanings, there seems to be a shared notion of imparting wisdom, guidance, and authority between the concepts of "mashal" and "moshel" in ancient Hebrew. Interesting food for thought! Let me know if you have any other questions.

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yehoshua steinberg

Feb 22, 2021

I happened to have been reading Jose Faur’s The Horizontal Society earlier today, and I saw that on Page 79 he writes:

The Hebrew mashal (root MShL) usually translated as ‘metaphor,’ and ‘proverb,’ is connected to moshel ‘ruler, legislator,’ because the ideal government, as per Ec 12:9, governs by issuing ‘aphorisms’ (including both the idea of ‘metaphor’ and ‘proverb’) to guide the people. In this sense mashal is an ‘analogy that governs,’ best understood in the light of Justice Cardozo’s remark, concerning the two forms of legal analogies, The Paradoxes of Legal Science, p. 8: The one searches for the analogy that is nearest in point of similarity, and adheres to it inflexibly. The other, in its choice of the analogy that shall govern, finds community of spirit more significant than resemblance of externality.

yehoshua steinberg

Feb 22, 2021

ANSWER: Menachem, Ibn Janach, and Radak all write that the shoresh משל has two separate meanings. That said, Rav Hirsch to Gen. 4:7 and Gen. 10:10 puts the two meanings together. It’s hard to do Rav Hirsch justice in my pathetic English, but basically he says something like משל meaning a way of expressing something’s identity or meaning. So in terms of a parable, it helps you clarify the נמשל and in terms of ruling, the ruler helps clarify everyone’s role by telling them what to do. You have to see it inside, it sounds nicer in Hebrew. That’s all I know off-hand. Please tell me if you find anything else