Avodah Mailing List

Volume 42: Number 54

Fri, 09 Aug 2024

• 1. Happy Day (Joel Rich)
• 2. Murder a Chok or Logically Compelling (Rabbi Meir G. Rabi)
• 3. Pilagshuth and Xuqqim (Jay F. Shachter)
• 4. Happy Day (Joel Rich)
• 5. kedusha on Shabbos (Joel Rich)

The Gemara taanit 31a gives one of the reasons that the 15th of av is such
a happy day is because they finish cutting the wood for the wood pile in
the temple. The Rashbam says the joy was because it was a completion of a
very big mitzvah, Rabbeinu Gershom says that it?s because up to now they
could not be learning tora during that time of cutting and now they could.
When we look at devarim 29:9-10, we see that the wood choppers in general
were slaves.
More than that if we look at yehoshua 9:21 and 23 we see again that the
wood choppers were slaves, and it makes the specific reference to the
temple and the gemara in yvamot 89a-b makes the connection clear.

I supposed we could reconcile these by saying that the slavery was related
to the temple times, but not necessarily in the temple or that the joy was
due to the mitzva but not who did it, but neither of those make me
particularly happy.
A lead from my son led me to this :

?????? ??? ??? ???? ????? ??? ? ???? ?
???? ???? ??? ?? ??????. ???????? ??? ???? ?????? ????? ??? ?? ?????? ?????
???? ????? ???? ???. ??? ?? ???? ??? ??? ????? ??? ??? ??? ???? ??? ???????
?? ???? ?????? ?????. ?????? ???? ??? ?????? ????? ???? ?????? ???. ?????
????? ??????. ???? ????. ??? ?? ?? ????????? ??? ?? ???? ????? ??? ??????
?????? ????? ???? ?????? ??? ???? ????? ??????? ???? ????? (??) ???? ?????
???? ???? ????? ????? ????? ???? ????????? ???? ??????. ?????? ????? ??
????? ?????? ?????? ????? ??? ????? ???? ?? ??? ?????? ???????? ????? ????
?????? ???. ???? ???? ???? ??? ????? ???? ?????? ??? ?????? ???? ???????
?????. ???? ???????. ?????? ??? ?? ???? ??? ??????? ???? ??? ?????? ??????
?????. ?? ??? ???? ????? ????? ????? ?????. ??? ?????? ???? ????? ??????
????? ??:

Any Thoughts, especially on ????? ???????

Bsorot Tovot

Joel Rich
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R' M Poppers  provided the following -
 "lo tirtzach" is a great example of r'tzon haBorei rather than of a
common-sense law -- as quoted b'sheim RYDS/the Rav z'l' (see

> > https://www.torahmusings.com/2018/02/chukim-mishpatim-no-difference/),
>
Where this illustration is offered
people stranded on a boat, where rescue is most unlikely. All will die of
starvation unless they kill one (or one volunteers - would it be a Mitzvah
for this person to kill themselves?) and the others will survive by
consuming this person's flesh.
Logic concludes that since they're anyway going to die, they ought to
choose life by randomly choosing one to kill.
Torah however rules that this is prohibited as murder, a gezeirat ha?katuv.

How do we know this is the Toirah ruling?
It is clear from Rashi (74a near the bottom of the page) Mai Chazis; "what
makes your blood redder than the other fellow's" that HKBH sees no
difference between one life or the other, the prohibition of murder is the
same be it a Rosh Yeshivah or an Am HaArets. However, it is clear that in
the eyes of HKBH, the death of two is worse than the death of one. If
however, the enforcer is threatening to kill him and his family unless he
kills the target, the Halacha is that he kills the target.


Sefaria
https://www.sefaria.org/Sanhedrin.74a.20?lang=bi&;with=Rashi
Gemara asks: *From where do we* derive this *halakha* with regard to *a
murderer himself,* that one must allow himself to be killed rather than
commit murder? The Gemara answers: *It is* based on *logical reasoning*
that one life is not preferable to another, and therefore there is no need
for a verse to teach this *halakha*. The Gemara relates an incident to
demonstrate this: *As* when *a certain person came before Rabba and said to
him: The lord of my place,* a local official, *said to me: Go kill
so-and-so, and if not I will kill you, what shall I do? Rabba said to him:
It is preferable that he should kill you and you should not kill. Who is to
say that your blood is redder than his, that your life is worth more than
the one he wants you to kill? Perhaps that man?s blood is redder. This
logical reasoning is the basis for the halakha that one may not save his
own life by killing another.*
Rashi
https://www.sefaria.org/Sanhedrin.74a.20?lang=bi&;with=Rashi
my translation
It is logically compelling because either way there is loss of only one
life [DeLeKa Ellah Chada Ibbud Neshamah] and the sin of murder, so he may
not transgress; because the Toirah [although it usually] commands that we
transgress in order to live [VaCahy Bahem] this is because HKBH values the
life of a Yid. However, here, since there is anyway a loss of a Y's life,
why might it be permitted to murder? Who can say that HKBH loves one life
more than another? Therefore, HKBHs command may not be transgressed.

BTW if childbirth presents with complications that jeopardizes the mother's
life, we save the m by killing the baby because the baby is not yet a
'life'.
However, once the baby is born, i.e. most of the head has emerged, it is a
'life' and we may not make the decision of which life to save, the b or the
m.
However, it would appear from Rashi [and I do not know if this is possible]
if both babies have emerged, it is now a Q of saving one or two lives, we
save two lives.
Are cojoined babies with two heads one or two lives?
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> 
> A case too extreme for us: If every marriage were pilagshus rather
> than qiddushin, there would be no new lines of mamzeirim. But something
> THAT fundamental to Qedushas Yisrael isn't getting avoided, even though
> mamzeirus is a problem ledoros.
> 

I don't know why I'm even responding to someone who says "Yuma", but I
am.  First, a pedantic distinction, which turns out not to be a
pedantic distinction: abolishing qiddushin and nissuin (except,
presumably, for the Kohen Gadol, who is obliged mid'oraitha to marry)
and thus abolishing adultery, would not, in your words, eliminate all
"new lines of mamzerim".  There will still be incest.

Moreover, although you may be the first person who has ever thought of
reforming Jewish society in this way, I suspect that other people have
thought of it too, before you did.  And they may have considered that
abolishing qiddushin and nissuin will quite likely have the opposite
of the intended effect, because it will increase the incidence of
incest, because people will often not know to whom they are related,
on their fathers' side, and they will commit incest without knowing.

(Plus you must surely realize that people will be wife swapping in
your brave new world, leaving their common-law spouses for a night and
then returning to them the next morning.  And this may not bother you
since no adultery is involved.  But, you know, the Torah could have
permitted a man to be maxazir eth grushatho after she married someone
else, and the Torah didn't; so it is a thing that seems to have
bothered the Author of the Torah, even if it doesn't bother you.  This
can be a discussion for another time, which is why this paragraph is
in parentheses.)

These new lines of mamzerim might not trouble you, though, because in
many of those cases, they'll never know that they are mamzerim, so
what's the harm?  Well, one could say that there will be cases when
people will find out, and that the incidence of those cases will not
be negligible, especially now that we have DNA testing, so you'll have
to abolish that too, 'cause it's better not to know those things,
right?

Although another thing that one could say, is that if you don't care
about creating mamzerim who don't know it, because they'll never know,
and their children will never know, and no prophet will ever tell them
-- well, with the same logic you shouldn't care all that much either
about creating mamzerim who do know it.  Because mamzeruth status does
not, practically speaking, last forever.  It gets lost, it gets
forgotten.  Do you really know that none of your wife's ancestors was
a mamzer or a mamzereth?  Or none of yours?  It's a rhetorical
question -- you don't.  People move around, they arrive in new
communities where no one knows them, they have a xezqath kashruth, and
no one knows.  In my own family, I personally have no knowledge of any
mamzeruth in my own ancestors, but there is a member of my family who
I know is a mamzer.  His mother nebbekh married her first husband,
because she wanted to be his wife and not his concubine, and I gotta
tell you, I don't think his children know.  And if his children do end
up marrying converts because some zealous shadkhen or shadkhente
suspected something, I don't think their children will know.  There's
no genetic marker, and it doesn't last, not in practice.

Related question: Suppose you're standing on the sidewalk in your
predominantly Jewish neighborhood, and you see a truck drive down the
street with a sign that says O'Brien's Quality Pork Products, and it
hits a bump and an unlabeled packet of meat falls off the truck.  You
cannot return it to its rightful owner because by the time you catch
up to the truck, the meat will have been unrefrigerated for too long,
and the owner will not want it.  You watch as your Jewish neighbor
turns the corner and sees the packet of meat in the street, and he
picks it up.  Do you say anything?

(By the way, I am actually in favor of reviving the ancient and
honorable institution of pilagshuth.  I just want people to think long
and clearly about these things, and to understand them thoroughly, and
to discuss them publicly, and at length, because stuff isn't simple.)

As for the xoq discussion, first of all, please don't quote any more
Hirsch etymologies, just as a matter of tza`ar ba`aley xayyim, 'cause
it hurts my ears.  Second of all, the word in the Torah that means the
same thing as "xoq", in Rabbinic Hebrew, is not "xoq".  It's "xuqqah".
A "xoq", in the Torah, is something else, it's a thing that you have
coming to you that you can count on.  I'm just sayin'.


               Jay F. ("Yaakov") Shachter
               6424 North Whipple Street
               Chicago IL  60645-4111
                       +1 773 7613784   landline
                       +1 410 9964737   GoogleVoice
                       j...@m5.chicago.il.us
                       http://m5.chicago.il.us

               When Martin Buber was a schoolboy, it must have been
               no fun at all playing tag with him during recess.

[I mis-moderated RJR's email by letting it through with no way for people
who can't see the Hebrew to see the quoted text. Here it is again,
but this time I am remembering to add a link.
-micha]

The Gemara taanit 31a gives one of the reasons that the 15th of av is such
a happy day is because they finish cutting the wood for the wood pile in
the temple. The Rashbam says the joy was because it was a completion of a
very big mitzvah, Rabbeinu Gershom says that it's because up to now they
could not be learning tora during that time of cutting and now they could.
When we look at devarim 29:9-10, we see that the wood choppers in general
were slaves.

More than that if we look at yehoshua 9:21 and 23 we see again that the
wood choppers were slaves, and it makes the specific reference to the
temple and the gemara in yvamot 89a-b makes the connection clear.

I supposed we could reconcile these by saying that the slavery was
related to the temple times, but not necessarily in the temple or that
the joy was due to the mitzva but not who did it, but neither of those
make me particularly happy. A lead from my son led me to this:

[If you're subscribed in digest mode and can't see the Hebrew, go
to Tosafos Yom Tov, Taanis 4:4 "qorban musaf ein bo bene'ilah"
<https://www.sefaria.org/Tosafot_Yom_Tov_on_Mishnah_Taanit.4.4.3>]

?????? ??? ??? ???? ????? ??? ? ???? ?
???? ???? ??? ?? ??????. ???????? ??? ???? ?????? ????? ??? ?? ??????
????? ???? ????? ???? ???. ??? ?? ???? ??? ??? ????? ??? ??? ??? ????
??? ??????? ?? ???? ?????? ?????. ?????? ???? ??? ?????? ????? ????
?????? ???. ????? ????? ??????. ??"? ??"?. ??? ?? ?? ????????? ??? ??
???? ????? ??? ?????? ?????? ????? ???? ?????? ??? ???? ????? ???????
???? ????? (?') ???? ????? ???? ???? ????? ????? ????? ???? ?????????
???? ??????. ?????? ????? ?' ????? ?????? ?????? ????? ??? ????? ????
?? ??? ?????? ???????? ????? ???? ?????? ???. ???? ???? ???? ??? ?????
???? ?????? ??? ?????? ???? ??????? ?????. ???? ???????. ?????? ??' ?'
???? ??? ??????? ???? ??? ?????? ?????? ?????. ?? ?"? ???? ????? ?????
????? ?????. ??? ?????? ???? ????? ?????? ????? ?':

Any Thoughts, especially on "???? ?????" [yitachein be'einai]?

Bsorot Tovot
Joel Rich

Anyone have a source as to why kedusha on Shabbos includes extra phrases
not included in the weekday version? I always assumed it was the same
reason that psukei dzimra is longer just because we have more time.
bsorot tovot
joel rich
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