Metatron: Anomalous Angel of the Countenance

Metatron: Anomalous Angel of the Countenance

[Rahab of Jericho confronted by the Sar Tzevaot, a figure sometimes identified as Metatron. An illustration by E.M. Lilien]

Metatron is a Sar (Princely Angel) who features prominently in Jewish esoteric literature. The name “Metatron” itself is a puzzle, being a Greek derived word meaning either meta-thronos, “beyond the throne,” metator, “guide,” or meta-tetra, “beyond the four [Angels of the Countenance].”

Reflecting the varied ways in which he appears in Jewish literature, Metatron has many other names and titles. Among the most common are Sar ha-Panim (Prince of the Countenance), Sar ha-Olam (Prince of the World), ha-Naar (the Youth), Marei de-Gadpei, (Master of Wings), and Yahoel. In the Merkavah traditions we learn that Metatron has twelve names, corresponding to the twelve tribes. This may account for the overlapping names and titles in the Metatron traditions (Sanh. 38b; Zohar I:21a).
Metatron’s place in the angelic host is anomalous for several reasons. So exalted is his status that in some sources he is referred to as the “Lesser YHWH” (Yev. 16b; Sanh. 38b). He is also unique in that he alone among the angels sits upon a throne, as does God. Because of this, Elisha ben Abuyah mistook him for a god and concludes there are “two powers in heaven” (Chag. 15a). Equally remarkable about Metatron is that, according to some traditions, he was once human – the antediluvian hero Enoch (Gen. 5; Jubilees 4:23; Sefer Hechalot 12:5). In III Enoch, Metatron describes to Rabbi Ishmael how he was transubstantiated from mortal to angelic form: Under the direction of Michael and Gabriel he grew in size until his body filled the whole universe (signaling a reversal of the “fall” of Adam Kadmon). He sprouted 72 wings (for each of the 72 names of God), grew 365,000 luminous eyes (indicating he had became omniscient, symbolized by acquiring 1000 eyes for each day of the year), and his material body burned away to be replace with a form of pure fire. Finally, he is given a crown resembling the crown worn by God. At times Metatron is described as the High Priest in the heavenly Temple, a role ascribed to Michael in other texts:

When the Holy Blessed One told Israel to set up the Mishkan [the portal sanctuary] He indicated to the ministering angels that they also should make a Mishkan, and when the one below was erected the other was erected on high. The latter was the tabernacle of the Naar (Youth) whose name was Metatron, and there he offers up the souls of the righteous to atone for Israel in the days of their exile. The reason then why it is written et ha-Mishkan, [The direct object marker et is read as "with", implying that there is something else unstated that was built with the desert sanctuary] is because another Mishkan was erected simultaneously with it. In the same way it says, The place, Adonai, which You have made for You to dwell in, the Sanctuary, O Lord, which Your hands have established [the parallelism of "place" and "sanctuary" is interpreted to mean two sanctuaries] (Ex. 25:17). (Num. R. 12:12)

 

In Sefer Zerubbabel, he is explicitly identified with Michael. He also functions as the heavenly scribe, writing 366 books. He teaches Torah to the righteous dead in the Yeshiva on High (A.V. 3b; Seder Gan Eden).

He is involved in events on earth as well as in heaven. He led Abraham through Canaan, delivered Isaac from his father’s knife, Wrestled with Jacob, led the Israelites in the desert, rallied Joshua before Jericho, and revealed the End of Times to Zerubbabel (Sefer Zerubbabel). Abraham Abulafia identifies him with the yetzer ha-tov, the human altruistic impulse.

In the Zohar, Metatron receives his most complex treatment. I am not completely confident I fully understand De Leon's multivalent and allusive teachings regarding Metatron, but I am clear he teaches Metatron is the first “offspring” of the supernal union of God’s feminine and masculine aspects (I: 143a, 162a-b). As such he is the personification of the lower sefirot, an idea obliquely alluded to in this description of Metatron as the "staff" of Moses [i.e., the instrument he uses to deliver the people]:

Similarly of Moses it is written, "And the staff of God was in his hand" [the staff that delivered the Israelites and smote the Egyptians]. This rod is Metatron, from one side of whom comes life and from the other death." [life and salvation flows from the "right" side of the sefirot, death and severity from the "left" side] (Zohar 1:27a).

 

The figure of Metatron fades in importance after the Zohar, but continues to appear in less prominent roles in later Kabbalism, sometimes in his older guises but more commonly as the angel of devekut [mystical union] (Sefer ha-Hezyanot I:23; Otzer Chayyim folio 111a).

Five Angry Angels - Moses, the Golden Calf, and Zombie Angels

Five Angry Angels - Moses, the Golden Calf, and Zombie Angels
http://ejmmm2007.blogspot.com/2012/03/five-angry-angels-moses-olden-calf-and.html


Many people are familiar with the episode in Ex. 32:11-13 where God wants to wipe out Israel in response to the egel zahav, the golden calf incident. Moses, according to the biblical version, talks God down and persuades the Holy One not to wipe out the people and make him, Moses, the new Abraham.

Less may be aware of the "zombie-fighting" Moses who appears in various midrashim. In these re-tellings, Moses again puts himself on the line for Israel, But in a much more dramatic way. According to this tale (variants appear in Exodus Rabbah (41.7; 44:8), Tanhuma (Ki Tissa 20), PdRE 45, and Deut. Rabbah (3.11), God unleashes five "destroying angels" (Af [or Haron-Af], Ketzaf, Mashchit [the three names are derived from Ps. 78], Chaimah [Deut. 9.19], and Hashmed [alt. M'lachah) against the people. Moses uses his lifeline to the amudei ha-olam, the meritorious ancestors (Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the three names in invokes in verse 13) to neutralize three of the angels with their powers of love, but Moses is left to dispatch the other two himself. Being a prayer-warrior, the son of Amram slays them with his sincere bakasha (supplication).

 

One of the intriguing features of this story is how God's anger is understood to become personified (or angelified, to be more specific), reflecting the rising medieval belief that God interacts with the world less directly and more through intermediaries.

It's also interesting how differently each source treats the role of the ancestral helpers. In several versions, the mere mention of the names deflect God's irritable messengers, but in one version, Abe, Izzy, and Jake actually rise from the grave, like a righteous zombie army! Then, just to round out the story, Moses buried the two ?corpses? of the angels he personally defeats and seals them in their graves using God's name (PdRE). Still, these zombie angels are a continuing threat to Israel, trying to rise up from their dual graves whenever the people sin. So to ensure they stay put, Moses is in turn buried opposite them (at Peor, as described in the Torah, Deut. 34.6) as a kind of spirit sentinel, keeping watch over Israel even in death. This is why it is called Beit Peor ("House of Peor," but literally, "two mouths" - get it?)

Here again we see angels used to created a mythologized theology - that the zechut avot, the merit of our ancestors, protects us and graciously shields us from divine wrath, even if we deserve it.

Torah Study vs. Earning a Livelihood, Part I

Torah Study vs. Earning a Livelihood, Part I

Chapter 2, Mishna 2(a)

By Rabbi Dovid Rosenfeld

"Rabban Gamliel the son of Rabbi Yehuda the Prince said: Good is Torah study together with a worldly occupation, for the exertion in both makes one forget sin. All Torah study without work will result in waste and will cause sinfulness. Anyone who works for the community should work for the sake of Heaven, for the merit of their [the community members'] forefathers will help him, and their righteousness endures forever. And as for you, [says G-d], I will grant you much reward as if you accomplished it on your own."
The first section of this mishna discusses the importance of self-sufficiency and earning a living. In spite of the primacy of Torah study in Jewish life, we are obligated to pursue the "ways of the land." (This is the literal translation of the Hebrew expression used in our mishna -- "derech eretz." The term is often used in reference to a worldly occupation -- and this is how the vast majority of the commentators understand it here. Sometimes the term more generally refers to all forms of proper and healthy interaction among men.)

Our mishna offers two reasons why we must support ourselves. The first is that Torah study combined with work causes one to "forget" sin. The simple meaning, as some commentators understand (Rabbeinu Yonah, Bartenura, R. Hirsch), is that if one holds down a full-time job and studies Torah in his remaining time, he will be too busy (as well as exhausted) to think about sinning. Idle time leads to wandering minds, fantasizing, and cooking up all sorts of wild schemes (Mishna Kesuvos 5:5). (As I once heard R. Noach Orlowek of Jerusalem observe, Pharaoh was actually the first one to point this out. When Moses and Aaron first approached him asking that he grant the Jews a few days off, Pharaoh's immediate reaction was: Make them work harder; they must have too much time to daydream. See Exodus 5.)
Another explanation of "forgetting" sin (Rashi, Meiri, see also Ruach Chaim) is that the combination of Torah study and self-sufficiency will safeguard a person from temptation. If we earn enough to make ends meet, we will have no overpowering temptation to steal from others. Further, if at the same time we study Torah, we will have the moral bearings to protect ourselves from temptation. We will develop a stronger sense of right and wrong, and we will incorporate the Torah's dictate of being happy with one's lot. Finally, the mere fact that we are not pursuing our careers relentlessly but are dividing our time between that and Torah study will stay the often insatiable drive for money and prestige.
The second reason offered by our mishna is that Torah study alone will result in "waste" and "sinfulness". The meaning is clear. One might think he is "saving" himself time by studying Torah without interruption. Money, however, is a problem which does not go away (does go away?), and such a person will soon be reduced to poverty and want. He will then have to start running around looking for some alternate means of support -- and the search will likely be frustrating and ongoing. He will be tempted to beg, cut ethical and legal corners, accept handouts, or outright steal in his desperation, all of which will lower his integrity and self-respect -- and all because he was too "holy" to be responsible for himself in the first place. And so, as R. Gamliel concludes, the end result will be "waste": Rather than his full-time study saving him time, such a person will become so occupied with the pursuit of money -- both mentally and emotionally -- that he will have neither time nor composure to study very much at all -- certainly far less than had he put in the necessary time into his profession and then devoted his remaining worry-free hours to the study of Torah.
The Sages state this even more clearly later in Pirkei Avos: "If there is no flour (dough?), there is no Torah; if there is no Torah, there is no flour" (3:21). Without a steady means of support -- not of wealth or extravagance, but of support -- there is not only "waste": there is no Torah whatsoever. There is simply no other way about it.
The commentator Rabbeinu Yonah (of 13th Century Spain) adds yet another important angle to this discussion. The psychological effects of not supporting oneself can as well be devastating. Even if one theoretically could subsist on handouts, it would destroy his self-esteem. Living off of others is antithetical to practically all of human virtue. King Solomon wrote: "One who hates gifts will live" (Proverbs 15:27). If one gets by without a sense of being productive himself, he does not have true life. Life is accomplishment and productivity. Sitting back expecting to be handed a welfare check destroys a person and his will to make something of himself. Such a person may feel he's pulling a fast one, getting something for nothing, but -- to invoke a cliche you haven't heard since grade school -- he isn't cheating anyone but himself. (Not that anyone took it very seriously back then, but perhaps we've all matured a little since.) We learned earlier: "Love work and despise high position" (1:10). We should want to work and make something of ourselves. And our agenda should be our own productivity, not our prestige or position on the totem pole. The Talmud writes: "One should flay carcasses in the marketplace and earn a living. He should not say I am a Priest, I am a great man and such work is beneath me" (Pesachim 113a). There is no such thing as being beneath one's dignity to put in an honest day's work. Work is what *gives* us our dignity, as well as our sense of self-worth.
sThe Sages thus view earning a living as a binding obligation, not so different from the many other mitzvos (commandments) of the Torah. (Or at least as an obligation upon one member of the family. In the kesuvah (or ketubah), the marriage contract between husband and wife, the husband assumes responsibility for the financial support of the family.) Likewise, the Talmud teaches us that a father is obligated to teach his son a profession, just as he is obligated to teach his son Torah (and to swim for that matter) (Kiddushin 29a).
There is, however, perhaps a single issue far more critical than everything we have written thus far. Maimonides (Mishne Torah, Talmud Torah 3:10) writes as follows: "Whoever thinks he will study Torah and not work and will be supported from charity, profanes G-d's Name, shames the Torah, darkens the light of knowledge, causes harm to himself, and takes his life from this world. For it is forbidden to derive benefit from the Torah in this world." (Anyone who has studied the works of Maimonides knows that he very rarely waxes poetic. His Hebrew is elegant in its simplicity and clarity of style, but he virtually never wastes his words or gets carried away. The above-quoted passage is practically one of a kind.) One who thrusts himself and the burden of his support upon others is not only harming himself in all the ways we discussed above. He is desecrating the Name of G-d. Of all people, it will be the Torah scholar who is degraded, who appears to the masses as the nuisance and pathetic beggar. He will disgrace not only himself but the Torah he represents. And this is a desecration of G-d's Name of the highest degree. Rather than the scholar's Torah study earning him the respect and admiration of the masses, he will be scorned and derided -- and it will so reflect on the Torah he is supposed to uphold. (For that matter, R. Berel Wein has observed that it was a far better arrangement in the days when the community rabbi did not draw a salary from his congregation. (We'll talk about such exceptions to the rule next week, G-d willing.) Once the rabbi is beholden to his constituents -- even for a well-deserved paycheck -- he will not be able to wield authority and speak his piece in the manner he sometimes must. The laymen hold the purse strings and run the board. The rabbi must answer to them rather than they to him.)
Thus far we have made a strong case against Torah study without sufficient means of support. Everyone without exception, it seems, should be earning his keep. However, as with most things in Judaism (and life), there are two sides to every issue. G-d willing next week we will explore some of the exceptions to this principle and their practical applications.

Jews and the Zodiac, pt. 1

Sunday, June 17, 2012

Jews and the Zodiac, pt. 1 - a Good Sign

Beit Alpha Synagogue floor

Modern Jews are largely ignorant of the degree to which astrology and, particularly, the zodiac, has played a  role in Jewish tradition. Famously, and frequently quoted, the Talmud says, Ain mazzel b'Israel ("Israel is not affected by the planets/fortune.") But remember, this is only one voice in the Talmud, the only religious document in the world that asserts one position, and its direct contradiction, simultaneously. Thus you can find opponents and proponents of the ideology of astrology and the influence of the stars on human affairs (even if not the affairs of Jews), and a variety of intermediate positions, all in the Talmud, and beyond.

The two great zodiac traditions we know today are the Greek and the Chinese, though many cultures have their particular systems for mapping the sky. While we may have gotten our start under the influence of Babylonian astrology, the great bulk of what has been preserved in the mesorah reflects our participation in the Greek tradition (See the 5th Century synagogue floor-mosaic above). Of course, Jews adapted it in ways suited to Jewish monotheism. Thus Sefer ha-Razim, for example, asserts that the zodiac is governed by angelic principalities, making the the system of destiny from the stars integral to the divine order.

But let's start slowly. With a seemingly simple word, mazzal  (or mazal, or as the moderns say it, mazel). Of course the ancient Israelites, like everyone else, had only few permanent celestial features they could see with the naked eye - the sun, moon, fixed stars, and five "wandering" stars, the planets.

In biblical Hebrew, mazal means "planet," or secondarily, "star" (there is a more specific word for star khokhav, as well as multiple words for the sun and the moon). Thus,  mazzalot (pl.) could mean "planets" as a group or "constellations." (Isaiah 13:10; Job 38:31-33).

These remote lights were assumed early on to be "signs" to humanity (Gen. 1:14-15) and the Children of Israel (Gen. 12, 15, et al). Hence the expression, Mazal tov/Siman tov! "A good star/a good sign [for you]!" i.e., "congrats!" So it is not surprising that more elaborate theories of how to interpret other meanings for these signs evolved.
The earliest evidence of Jewish divining the skies for esoteric meaning and messages appears in the Dead Sea Scrolls (2nd century BCE). There two fragments in particular, 4Q318 (Brontologion) and 4Q186 (Horoscope). The first concerns itself with brontology, the mantic interpretation of  4Q318 weather, such as thunder (and, often, transient celestial events, like comets and meteor s Q4186howers).also includes some skeletal references to the babylonian zodiac. The other document,, is particularly of interest because it shows the effort to tease out the human implication of what unfolds in the heavens, the essence of what we mean when we use the word astrology today.

So this is interesting, but given the often sectarian nature of the material preserved at Qumran, we need to be cautious about any conclusions we can draw from it about the rabbinic tradition of Judaism. But it is enough for now to know that Jewish interest is the stars is very old, indeed.

Don't kill those "weeds"!

Don't kill those "weeds"!

Do a random search for foraging and you will find more and more sites, blogs, and books popping up every day written by folks relearning and sharing the bounty of the wild.
Now I know, when you hear the word "foraging", images come to mind of folks dressed in woodsy gear traipsing deep into the forests searching for rare mushrooms or strange plants. I'm not saying this doesn't happen. Because it does. And it's awesome. But you don't have to go into the woods to find a wealth of food. It is growing right under your nose. The wild is everywhere! Even in the city sidewalks.

After all, Mother Nature knows that just what we need following a long winter is a good cleansing. She provides just that through the first plants that push up through the cool soil.

Here are just a few of the plants seen growing here on the farm and all over the area in the past few weeks.

Eli's favorite, Field Speedwell (Veronica persica).

This lovely early bloomer makes a refreshing tea. Boil and steep 2 c. water, 1 handful of fresh, washed speedwell. Add honey or other herbs/spices to taste. The beautiful tiny blue flowers along with the rest of the plant can be used as an expectorant for coughs, digestive aid, and blood cleanser. Remove those toxins! Freshen that skin!

 

 

Dead Nettle (Lamium purpureum), it's everywhere! 

Used in soups, salads, and teas this bad boy can be eaten cooked or raw. The leaves, flowers and stem are all edible. It is high in iron and fiber and is a great detoxifier, astringent, and diuretic. Did I say detox???
Spring Onions, tasty.

You'll find clumps of this stuff growing among your grass. It's usually taller and it has a thin, rounded hollow stalk. Sometimes the ends curl up like the ones in the photo. The best way to identify these fellas is to smell them. If it smells like onions, it's onions! The best way to use them? Any way you would use chives.

And the ever popular, always healthy Dandelion (Taraxacum officinale).

You know these beauties. They are commonly seen being attacked by humans trying to rid them from their lawns, spreading people's wishes all over the land, or having their "heads popped off" by children of all ages. Very easy to identify. These plants are called dynamic accumulators for their ability to pull nutrients through their long, strong tap rots from deep in the soil. These nutrients are what give the plant its healthy punch. The list of health benefits from this crazy little lion plant range from liver support to diabetes, bone health, skin disorders, urinary problems, high blood pressure, anemia, weight loss, and much more! It is packed full of iron, fiber, vitamin C, protein and all sorts of other health words. It's amazing that all of us aren't out there digging it up right now and chowing down!

I dug up a bunch of this at the farm last week, brought it home, got out my biggest soup pot and made a giant batch. I made so much I got to share it with my friends.  It was raving good, we had it all finished by the next day! I loosely followed this recipe and must add that we all liked it better the second day. Be sure to use the whole plant, not just the greens. Remember those dynamic roots! 

We good folks here at the Farmacy have been busy harvesting tons of this glory and prepping it for use for our Community Supported Medicine members. Pretty soon, boxes will be arriving packed with fresh goodies made from our Dandelions and other natural wonders, just for you. 

Don't forget to sign up for your share today! 

Go for it! Step outside and pick some dinner! I dare you.
-Shauna


NOTES: Please be aware of any pesticides or any other chemicals that have been applied to the area before picking and ingesting any wild food. Also, never eat any wild food that you cannot identify with 100% accuracy. Check your field guides. Only eat small amounts of any food you are trying for the first time, in case of allergies.

DIY: Do-It-Yourself Reality.

Thursday, November 15, 2012

DIY: Do-It-Yourself Reality.

One of the special delights that have evolved in my life the past few years is a new hevruta of study companions. You have the fruits of some of our studies in past entries. Currently we continue our study of Kedushat Levi, the Hasidic commentary to the Torah of Yitzakh Levi of Berditchev. here is the translation of a wonderful reflection of prayer and the zug (partnership) of God and humanity:

[An] additional explanation: Bereshit - [read it as] bet (two/double) beginning. 

The Blessed Name bestows shefa [beneficent outpouring] and we through our prayers make an opening in the divine outpouring [allowing it to reach the prayer], each according to his [i.e., human] will. 

This one [for example] will make an opening by means of the letters of chayyim (life) for [enhanced] life; That one with the letters of chokhmah (wisdom) for [greater] wisdom; 

Another with the letters of osher (wealth) for wealth.[1] 

And thus [it is] for all goods, each [may be used] according to our will. 

Look, for everything that is [found] in the [the realm] of the spirit, there is something analogous to it in the [realm of] the physical. 

So look, in the physical [universe] there is sound and speech.

 The sound is the matrix/container,[2] while speech is the opening [3] for the sound made through letters [to activate the shefa].  

Thus [for example] on Rosh ha-Shanah, the sound of the shofar is [or signifies] the outpouring from the Blessed Creator - it is the matrix.

 And when we say the malchut, zechronot, and shofarot [4], it is the opening by which we shape the outpouring of the Creator through the letters/words, every individual according to his will. 

[Hands-on Judaism: young Kolamites making their own shofar]

See, this outpouring matrix that flows from the Creator, it is the aspect [we know as] the written Torah [which is given to us]. 

While this opening we make for the outflow through letters, this is the aspect of the oral Torah, it being the will of Israel, when they make interpretation of the written Torah  [5]. 

So this [is the meaning of] bereshit - "double beginning [to the universe]" - the [combination of] written Torah and the oral Torah [bring creation into being].[6]

1. This is based on the word mysticism of Sefer Yetzirah, which regards the letters of the Hebrew Alef-Bet as the building blocks of creation. Very much analogous to the periodic table, where elements can be combined to make useful compounds, it is taught that proper application of the letters and words of Hebrew allows the adept to construct reality from them. This is also a testimony to the Jewish notion of humanity dignity and power. God gives us the raw materials of the natural (and supernatural) order, but we may mold them and shape them to our needs and the needs of the world. 

2. the translation of calul here is debatable. I welcome a better suggestion, 

3. Tzimtzum literally means contraction/condensing. The image is a space created in the membrane between the spiritual and physical realms to allow the shefa to enter one's life, i.e., spoke prayer attunes us to the divine "frequency," while the words themselves serve as the access code for translating the spiritual bounty into physical reality. 

4. the three liturgies that accompany the blowing] consists of verses that refer to these three themes. Each verse is specifically selected for their upbeat message for Israel and the world. The liturgy, of course, is a Jewish creation, an addition to the purely biblical command to sound the shofar on the holiday. The significance of this will be evident at the end of the homily. 
5. Here the theme of partnership (and mutual dependency) really gets highlighted, and in a somewhat counter-tradition manner. Jewish thinkers have tended to treat all the two Torahs, the written Torah and it's on-going interpretation, as God-given. Rabbi Yitzakh unpacks that flattening, monistic thinking by reclaiming the oral Torah as a human creation, and the very thing that renders the divine gift of Torah (Torah = divine outpouring) meaningful on the physical plane. Without us and our wordy, argumentative ancestors, the Torah would be divine, surely, but inert and unable to benefit the world, like a heap of iron ore that need human intervention to refine it, reshape it, and make it into tools.

6. The biggest metaphysical claim of all - that only through the combined efforts of God and humanity that the universe exists.  

When Adam Did Fall Did Sin We All?

 When Adam Did Fall Did Sin We All? The Fall of Man and Original Sin [not in] Judaism

Once again recently (it happens quite a bit here in Texas), I ended up discussing the culpablity of Adam and Eve in light of the death of Jesus. For traditional Christians, of course, the "Fall of Man" or the "Fall from Grace," is a massively important doctrine.

[Eden story from a medieval Jewish manuscript]

This "Fall" is more than the story of the expulsion from Eden as described in Genesis, mind you. Like all religions (Jews do it too), Early Christianity, starting with Paul, attached and extrapolated all kinds of extra-biblical claims to the obvious meaning of Gen. chapter 3 (we all will die, we will have to labor for our food, women will suffer during childbirth, we hate snakes).

For Christians, the two most important add-ons are that of
a) "original sin" -- that the sin of disobeying God attaches not just to the first couple, but to all their offspring (i.e., us), and
b) that the punishment for that is "eternal damnation," not just death in this world (as Genesis states, explicitly), but "death" in the next world, in the form of eternal exile from God into a suffering afterlife.

The Christian solution, of course, is Jesus. But for Jesus to be the cure, then the illness, original sin, needs to be "real." That, it seems, includes the idea that Adam and Eve were real, historical, flesh-and-blood people. A mythic first couple won't serve. A metaphor simply cannot carry the weight of justifying the kind of real, metaphysically transformative sacrifice Christians credit to Jesus. Thus the constant kerfuffle over the historicity of Genesis.
Jews, too have argued over the literal truth of Genesis 1-4, though not so much in the Modern era. While there is a small bundle of naive, anti-modernist ultra-orthodox (Haredi) Jews who cling to the historicity of Genesis, the vast majority of Jews, building on our own 2000 year old tradition of metaphoric interpretation, generally view the Eden narrative as important, but not factual.

Key to our relative equanimity about this is that Judaism does not have a doctrine of "Original sin." We simply do not read human nature through "Fall-colored glasses." How can this be? Well first, we don't pile on a lot of additional punishments to the ones listed in Gen. 3. Even if we assumed that Eden was a historical event, we don't think all humanity bears the guilt of past people's crimes, though we all must live with the consequences that flow from the decisions of earlier generations (who can undo the past?).

Moreover, there are key linguistic features in the story that suggest that even the author of Genesis did not take the expulsion from Eden so literally. The key feature being "names." The first couple actually have none. The English Bible would have you believe they were named "Adam" and "Eve." But the Hebrew actually says, ha-adam "the earthling," and he first calls her ishah, "woman." Later he redubs her chavah, "live [giving]" (3:20) after she proves the capacity to be, well, life-giving. But this hardly a name, as the animals (who already showed their capacity to reproduce) are called chayah, "living [creature]." One letter now distinguishes her from other reproducing creatures - hardly a personal name. And "the earthling" never loses the definitive article (the) from his name, demonstrating that it is a common, rather than proper noun (it's not his name). Hebrew works exactly like English in this regard. We say "David" rather than "the David," because a proper noun is innately definite. The point? These two figures are meant to be "everyman" and "everywoman," universal "types" of humans, rather historical ancestors. That's why its no continuity problem for the author to introduce Cain's wife in Chapter 4 - it's a mythic account of a universal human experience, not a  historic event.

Moreover, Jews have never required the kind of metaphysical heavy lifting from the Eden story that Christianity has. There is a simple reason for that - we take our cue from the rest of the Hebrew Bible. While it's position in the first four chapters gives it great prominence, the fact is that Adam, Eve, Eden, and the expulsion get virtually no play in subsequent biblical texts. You would think that if Eden and its loss defines what it is to be human, and the true condition of human nature, that the prophets would allude to it fairly frequently, as in "You are just like your ancestors, Adam and Eve..." or "Because of what God decreed in Eden...." But no. The figures "Adam" and "Eve," ha-adam and chavah, never get a mention throughout the rest of the Hebrew Bible. Never (well, maybe once, just to cover my bases, but my research indicates never). So much for a defining story. And Eden, well... It does get passing mention, mostly in Ezekiel, as the location of the ideal mythic past. But getting expelled? Nope. God's continuing wrath and alienation over the sin of Eden? Never.

What are we to make of this silence? It means one of two things, either
a) The authors of the rest of Bible don't know Gen. 1-4 (i.e., it was written only after they wrote their books), or
b) they didn't think it was a big deal story.

We can see a big deal story they do care about - the Exodus. The rest of the Bible: the prophets, the historical books, the Psalms, are constantly alluding to the Exodus. THAT'S the story that matters. THAT'S the story you need to teach to your children.

And that, by the way, is the biggest theme that post-biblical Jews extrapolate from the Eden story - it's a foreshadowing of our exile from the promised land, our harsh work and difficult labors (in both sense of the word) in Egypt. Eden is a sign for us, but one of both regret and hope. Jews take from Eden not the notion of human "sinfulness," but that human life and human history is a series of exiles and homecomings.