"The Sun Will Rise Without Thy Assistance" - Attributably?

June 18, 2013 8:43 PM

There are a lot of places attributing the quote ""The sun will rise without thy assistance" to the Talmud. Is that true? If so, where does it say that in the Talmud? I would love to either verify or debunk this quote.
posted by juniperesque to Writing & Language (2 answers total)

I can find lots of references to it, going as far back as 1876 (the quote seems to be that the sun will SET, though). I can't find any specific reference to where in the Talmud it comes from.
posted by empath at 9:00 PM on June 18, 2013

Best answer: The wording close to what you posted is from a book by H. Polano from 1876 called "The Talmud: Selections."

Under proverbs and sayings of the Rabbis, he lists "The sun will set without thy assistance."

Now, I figured this is probably from Pirkei Avot(ethics of the Fathers), which is a collection of proverbs dealing with ethics, but its not.

The actual quote is in a couple of places in the Talmud, Pes 90b(6) // Naz 64b(16) which says "The sun sets of itself," so while your exact quote is not from the Talmud, a variation certainly is.
posted by jalitt at 10:05 AM on June 19, 2013