Of Heretics and Apostates
The Hebrew language has no shortage of colorful insults and epithets that can be hurled at Jewish heretics and other disbelievers. In this essay, we explore some of those words used in reference to such people — like min, apikores, kofer, meshumad, and mumar — attempting to clarify their exact definitions and how they may differ from one another. In colloquial speech, many of these terms are used interchangeably or have overlapping definitions, but in more scholarly discourse (especially in Maimonidean codification) each carries a specific meaning, on which we will hone in. In this essay, we will also explore some of the possible etymological bases of these words.
Let’s start with the word apikores. While this word never appears in the Bible, it does appear twice in the Mishnah — once when relating that an apikores has no share in the World to Come (Sanhedrin 10:1) and once when stating that a Torah Scholar should know how to do respond to an apikores (Avot 2:14). Conventional wisdom ties this Rabbinic Hebrew term to the Greek philosopher Epicurus (341–270 BCE), who touted the hedonistic pursuit of physical pleasure as a way of life. As mentioned above, HaBachur also sees the term apikores as deriving from the name of a person, but adds that because the eponymous term refers to one who insults Torah Scholars, it makes sense to presume that the term’s antecedent in the historical Epicurus also engaging in insulting those who study Torah. Maimonides in his commentary to the Mishnah (Sanhedrin there) actually explains the word apikores as related to the word hefker (“ownerless”), which we discussed in an earlier essay “Defining Freedom” (Mar. 2028).
The tern kofer derives from the triliteral root KAF-PEH-REISH, which in Mishnaic Hebrew begets verbs related to the act of “denying” (for example, Shevuot 4:1, 4:3-4, 5:1-2, 6:3 in the context of a legal deposition in which a litigant denies the claims of the plaintiff). In the sense of a “heretic” or “denier,” the Hebrew kofer parallels the usage of its Arabic cognate kafir. In Biblical Hebrew, a whole slew of
