Комментарий к Авот 4:14

BECAUSE YOUR COLLEAGUES WILL TEACH IT TO YOU. Rav: do not rely on your colleagues to come from the master’s house and teach you the Torah. If so, the entire mishna reads as one thing: Exile yourself… and do not say that it will come after you because your friends will teach it to you. Some editions have “and that your friends will teach it to you,” as Midrash Shmuel writes in the name of Abarbanel.

Rabbi Nehorai says: Exile yourself to a place of Torah: That you should live in a place that has much Torah and many sages in it.

He said [to] seek a [proper] place for reading and study, as the reading will become firm and be established [when you are] with another [person]. And do not rely upon your [own] understanding and say that you do not need colleagues and students that will stimulate you.

"Exile yourself to a place of Torah": if there are no Torah scholars in your place.

Introduction Some believe that name of Nehorai is a nickname for either Rabbi Meir, Rabbi Nehemiah or Rabbi Elazar ben Arach. The word Nehorai means “full of light” in Aramaic. Others believe that Nehorai is the name of a tanna who was a student of Rabbi Joshua and Rabbi Tarphon.

and do not say that it will follow after you, that your colleagues will make it yours: Do not rely upon your colleagues that went to study, that they will come and teach you. As you, yourself, need to exile yourself with them and to pursue the Torah if you want to know it.

"and do not say that it will follow after you": Torah scholars will come here.

Rabbi Nehorai said: go as a [voluntary] exile to a place of Torah and say not that it will come after you, for [it is] your fellow [student]s who will make it permanent in your hand and “and lean not upon your own understanding” (Proverbs 3:5). Rabbi Nehorai teaches that one should leave one’s home and search out someone with whom to learn Torah for one cannot learn Torah on one’s own. Torah study is best done in the company of others, with a “hevruta” and with a teacher. Remember that since the Oral Torah was not yet written down at this point, learning Torah on one’s own was next to impossible. If one was lucky and wealthy he might have had a copy of the written Torah, but the Mishnah and all of the other compositions of the rabbis did not yet exist and even when they were compiled, they were learned orally. Although in our day we have books and one can learn Torah without a hevruta, it is still far more effective to learn with a hevruta. Furthermore, one cannot really begin to learn Talmud without a teacher, someone to explain how to read the Talmud and understand what the arguments mean. Rabbi Nehorai emphasizes that a person should not wait for a teacher to come to him. He must go out and even go into exile in order to find a teacher. Perhaps in the word “exile” Rabbi Nehorai hints that one may even leave the land of Israel to go study Torah. In general exile from the land of Israel was seen as a punishment and it was forbidden for a person to initiate such an exile. However, if exile is for the sake of Torah, it is permitted, and even under some circumstances, encouraged.

Do not rely on your understanding: Even when you do study and exile yourself to a place of Torah and become wise, "do not rely on your understanding" - that you not depend upon your rationale; but rather you should do all of the deed according to the counsel of the sages.

"that your colleagues will make it yours": And do not rely upon your colleagues when they return from the house of the teacher that they will make it yours, such that you will learn from them what they learned from the teacher. But rather, exile yourself - you yourself - to the place of the teacher, since learning from the mouth of the student is not the same as learning from the mouth of the teacher. Another explanation: "as your colleagues will make it yours" - Why do I say to you, "Exile yourself to a place of Torah?" Because "your colleagues will make it yours;" as even if you are sharp and extremely analytical, the Torah will only be yours through your colleagues with whom you give and take. And that is [the reason] that it ends, "Do not rely on your understanding."