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úÌÈîÄéã ðÄùÑÀçÈè áÌÄùÑÀîåÉðÆä åÌîÆçÁöÈä åÀ÷ÈøÅá áÌÀúÅùÑÇò åÌîÆçÁöÈä.
áÌÀòÇøÀáÅé ôÀñÈçÄéí ðÄùÑÀçÈè áÌÀùÑÆáÇò åÌîÆçÁöÈä åÀ÷ÈøÅá áÌÄùÑÀîåÉðÆä åÌîÆçÁöÈä, áÌÅéï áÌÇçÉì áÌÅéï áÌÇùÌÑÇáÌÈú.
çÈì òÆøÆá ôÌÆñÇç ìÄäÀéåÉú áÌÀòÆøÆá ùÑÇáÌÈú,
ðÄùÑÀçÈè áÌÀùÑÅùÑ åÌîÆçÁöÈä åÀ÷ÈøÅá áÌÀùÑÆáÇò åÌîÆçÁöÈä, åÀäÇôÌÆñÇç àÇçÂøÈéå:
The daily sacrifice is slaughtered at eight and one half hours and is offered at nine and one half. On
the day before Pesaĥ it was slaughtered at seven and one half hours and offered at eight and one half,
regardless of whether it is a weekday or Shabbat. But if the day before Pesaĥ falls on Shabbat it is
slaughtered at six hours and one half and offered at seven hours and one half, and the paschal lamb
afterwards.
EXPLANATIONS:
1: Our tractate is following a strict timetable, starting with events that must take place on the evening after Nisan 13th (the search for ĥametz and associated laws). It then continued to events that are associated with the morning of Nisan 14th up to noon (and some associated laws). Chronologically, the next item on the Pesaĥ agenda is the slaughter of the paschal lambs which, as we have already noted on several occasions, took place after noon on Nisan 14th.
2:
3:
4: DISCUSSION:
The last mishnah of Chapter 4 was concerned with certain deeds of the biblical King Hezekiah for which
the sages expressed their approval or disapproval. Albert Ringer writes: A question on method. The text says they did (not) protest and we read 'sages' for they, just as with the previous texts. However, in Hezekiah's time, the sages did not exist, it was still the period of the prophets. Moreover, the halacha you quote in the name of Rabban Shim'on ben-Gamli'el is from the second century, about a millennium apart from the time of Hazekiah. How does the tradition interpret the word 'they' in this text? How should we interpret it? I respond: Albert is reading these texts with modern eyes. We have a historical appreciation and use rational criticism to evaluate a text (any text). The sages, however, are less concerned with historicity than they are concerned with tradition. According to tradition it was Moses who created the very first Sanhedrin during the desert wanderings [Numbers 11:16ff], and there was an unbroken chain throughout the ages. Some leaders and kings were seen as cooperating with the sages of the Sanhedrin, others were seen as doing the opposite. In short, to the Tannaitic sages the Sanhedrin was an institution that reached back through the ages to Moses at Sinai. This is the essential meaning of tractate Avot 1:1.
On February 7th we had occasion to mention the 'poor law' of the Torah - the donations that farmers were required to allocate for the poor and the indigent. Mike Mantel writes: Is there a Halachic implication for non agrarians in the poor laws today? I respond: From the strictly halakhic point of view these laws are held to be in abeyance for reasons that need not detain us here. For the past 1500 years or so the concept of Tzedakah has functionally replaced the old agrarian laws. Every Jew is required by Torah law to set aside from his net annual income up to (but no more than) 20% for charitable purposes. The sum usually set aside by pious people is 10%.
äÇôÌÆñÇç ùÑÆùÌÑÀçÈèåÉ ùÑÆìÌÉà ìÄùÑÀîåÉ, åÀ÷ÄáÌÅì åÀäÄìÌÅêÀ åÀæÈøÇ÷ ùÑÆìÌÉà ìÄùÑÀîåÉ,
àåÉ ìÄùÑÀîåÉ åÀùÑÆìÌÉà ìÄùÑÀîåÉ, àåÉ ùÑÆìÌÉà ìÄùÑÀîåÉ åÀìÄùÑÀîåÉ, ôÌÈñåÌì.
ëÌÅéöÇã ìÄùÑÀîåÉ åÀùÑÆìÌÉà ìÄùÑÀîåÉ, ìÀùÑÅí ôÌÆñÇç åÌìÀùÑÅí ùÑÀìÈîÄéí.
ùÑÆìÌÉà ìÄùÑÀîåÉ åÀìÄùÑÀîåÉ, ìÀùÑÅí ùÑÀìÈîÄéí åÌìÀùÑÅí ôÌÆñÇç:
A paschal lamb is invalid if it is not slaughtered for that specific purpose, if its blood was not
received and carried [to the altar] for that specific purpose or if the act was of ambiguous purpose.
How are we to understand 'specific purpose'? - paschal lamb and a goodwill offering and vice versa.
EXPLANATIONS:
1: Thousands of people thronged the courtyard of the Bet Mikdash during the afternoon of Nisan 14th, each bringing a lamb to be slaughtered and then taken away and roasted in readiness for the Seder service that evening. When people perform a ritual act in such numbers it is inevitable that while some will have altruistic reasons others may be bringing their lamb simply because everyone else is and they don't want to be different. If such a person acquires a lamb for that very purpose (even if it is for social reasons, for instance) then there is no halakhic problem. But if they already possessed a lamb which they had bought for another ritual purpose and they did not make the necessary switch of purpose in their mind there is a halakhic problem.
2:
3:
4:
åÇàÂîÇøÀúÌÆí æÆáÇçÎôÌÆñÇç äåÌà ìÇéäÉåÈä àÂùÑÆø ôÌÈñÇç òÇìÎáÌÈúÌÅé áÀðÅéÎéÄùÒÀøÈàÅì áÌÀîÄöÀøÇéÄí
áÌÀðÈâÀôÌåÉ àÆúÎîÄöÀøÇéÄí åÀàÆúÎáÌÈúÌÅéðåÌ äÄöÌÄéì åÇéÌÄ÷ÌÉã äÈòÈí åÇéÌÄùÑÀúÌÇçÂååÌ:
You shall say, 'It is the passover sacrifice to the Lord, because He passed over the houses of the
Israelites in Egypt when He smote the Egyptians, but saved our houses.'
And Deuteronomy 16:1 reads:
ùÑÈîåÉø àÆúÎçÉãÆùÑ äÈàÈáÄéá åÀòÈùÒÄéúÈ ôÌÆñÇç ìÇéäåÉÈä àÁìÉäÆéêÈ
ëÌÄé áÌÀçÉãÆùÑ äÈàÈáÄéá äåÉöÄéàÂêÈ éÀäåÉÈä àÁìÉäÆéêÈ îÄîÌÄöÀøÇéÄí ìÈéÀìÈä:
Observe the month of Abib [spring blossoming] and offer a passover sacrifice to the Lord your God, for it
was in the month of Abib, at night, that the Lord your God freed you from Egypt.
The Gemara reads:
From where do we know that [the paschal lamb] must be slaughtered for
that specific purpose? Rabbi [Ab]ba quotes Rav: "You shall say,
'It is the passover sacrifice'" [it being understood as
this, which is supported by the Hebrew]. This means that if it was sacrificed as a paschal
offering it is valid, otherwise it is not. And from where do we know [that
the same applies to] the other ritual acts? 'Offer a passover sacrifice' means that all its acts
must be for the purpose of the passover sacrifice.
DISCUSSION
In a 'purple passage' I wrote: Shabbat is the most sacred ritual mitzvah that our Torah knows. (The
ramifications of its observance are so spiritual and ideological that I am not certain that it can
justifiably be classed purely as a ritual.) It is my conviction that the decision by the American
Conservative rabbinate of 50 years ago to permit the use of the automobile on Shabbat was a grievous
error... Keith H. Bierman writes: Well said! In addition it should be noted that Conservative Schuls (and the Rabbis who serve there) seldom (never in my experience) invest any effort into educating the congregation as to the serious limitations the ruling placed (e.g. no purchasing of fuel, no side trips, travel to the closest schul only, etc.). While I agree with you the ruling was itself a mistake, it is greatly compounded by the lack of care in it's application. In addition to the halachic reasoning, it seemed to me (it's been a long time since I read the text of the ruling), that the conservative sages were attempting to bring in 'extra-halachic' reasoning in that in the suburbs of the US it might not be feasible to get a minyan of walkers, therefore.... The problem (if, in fact, that was part of their motoviation/reasoning) is that this heter has largely ensured that people will drive. In my experience, US Conservative Jews seldom make the effort to live near the shul and when picking locations for new schuls seldom focus on the proximity to desirable housing. As an example, in my congregation, the schul has been in the same place for something like 40 years - with the exception of a handful of congregants and the rabbi, everyone drives. Many of the members have been members for decades, and despite the proximity of nice housing with ample yards, have never moved to within walking distance. So the effect of the heter, as I see it, has been to increase the distance between congregation and schul, and typically between congregants. Thus there is never any chance of an eruv, and the typically lower density of observant families has obvious shortcomings for shabat social and weekday business activities.
ùÑÀçÈèåÉ ùÑÆìÌÉà ìÀàåÉëÀìÈéå åÀùÑÆìÌÉà ìÄîÀðåÌéÈéå, ìÈòÂøÅìÄéí åÀìÇèÀîÅàÄéí, ôÌÈñåÌì.
ìÀàåÉëÀìÈéå åÀùÑÆìÌÉà ìÀàåÉëÀìÈéå, ìÄîÀðåÌéÈéå åÀùÑÆìÌÉà ìÄîÀðåÌéÈéå, ìÇîÌåÌìÄéí åÀìÈòÂøÅìÄéí, ìÇèÌÀîÅàÄéí åÀìÇèÌÀäåÉøÄéí, ëÌÈùÑÅø.
ùÑÀçÈèåÉ ÷ÉãÆí çÂöåÉú, ôÌÈñåÌì, îÄùÌÑåÌí ùÑÆðÌÆàÁîÇø áÌÅéï äÈòÇøÀáÌÈéÄí.
ùÑÀçÈèåÉ ÷ÉãÆí ìÇúÌÈîÄéã, ëÌÈùÑÅø, åÌáÄìÀáÇã ùÑÆéÌÀäÅà àÆçÈã îÀîÈøÅñ áÌÀãÈîåÉ, òÇã ùÑÆéÌÄæÌÈøÅ÷ ãÌÇí äÇúÌÈîÄéã.
åÀàÄí ðÄæÀøÇ÷, ëÌÈùÑÅø:
A paschal lamb is invalid if it was slaughtered for those who will not eat it, are not subscribed to it,
are uncircumcised or ritually impure. It is valid [if it was slaughtered]
for [a company which consisted of] both those who would and would not
eat it, both those who were and who were not subscribed, both
circumcised and uncircumcised persons, and both ritually pure and impure. If it was slaughtered before
noon it is invalid, since the Torah says 'at twilight'. If it was slaughtered before the Daily Sacrifice
it is valid provided that someone stirred the blood until [after] the
blood of the Daily Sacrifice has been sprinkled; if it was sprinkled it is valid.
EXPLANATIONS:
1: In order to understand our mishnah we must accept that there were certain conditions imposed upon the paschal lamb that was to be eaten as part of the Seder service. The first condition was subscription. The Torah [Exodus 12:3-4] states:
ãÌÇáÌÀøåÌ àÆìÎëÌÈìÎòÂãÇú éÄùÒÀøÈàÅì ìÅàîÉø áÌÆòÈùÒÉø ìÇçÉãÆùÑ äÇæÌÆä
åÀéÄ÷ÀçåÌ ìÈäÆí àÄéùÑ ùÒÆä ìÀáÅéúÎàÈáÉú ùÒÆä ìÇáÌÈéÄú:
åÀàÄíÎéÄîÀòÇè äÇáÌÇéÄú îÄäÀéåÉú îÄùÌÒÆä åÀìÈ÷Çç äåÌà åÌùÑÀëÅðåÉ äÇ÷ÌÈøÉá àÆìÎáÌÅéúåÉ
áÌÀîÄëÀñÇú ðÀôÈùÑÉú àÄéùÑ ìÀôÄé àÈëÀìåÉ úÌÈëÉñÌåÌ òÇìÎäÇùÌÒÆä:
Speak to the whole community of Israel and say that on the tenth of this month each of them shall take a
lamb to a family, a lamb to a household. But if the household is too small for a lamb, let him share one
with a neighbor who dwells nearby, in proportion to the number of persons: you shall contribute for the
lamb according to what each household will eat.
From this it was clear to the sages that people were to subscribe to a group that would together eat a
paschal lamb. Obviously, one person could not consume a whole lamb by themselves, and probably not even
one family. Since the Torah [Exodus 12:10] also says that none of the lamb should be left
over until the following morning it was necessary to create a group of people who would club together in
advance to share a lamb. The Hebrew translated above 'contribute' really means something more like
'number off'.
2:
3:
åÀëÄéÎéÈâåÌø àÄúÌÀêÈ âÌÅø åÀòÈùÒÈä ôÆñÇç ìÇéäÉåÈä äÄîÌåÉì ìåÉ ëÈìÎæÈëÈø åÀàÈæ éÄ÷ÀøÇá ìÇÍòÂùÒÉúåÉ
åÀäÈéÈä ëÌÀàÆæÀøÇç äÈàÈøÆõ åÀëÈìÎòÈøÅì ìÉàÎéÉàëÇì áÌåÉ:
If a stranger who dwells with you would offer the passover to God, all his males must be circumcised;
then he shall be admitted to offer it; he shall then be as a citizen of the country. But no uncircumcised
person may eat of it.
4: The prohibition against the ritually impure is clearly implied in a different part of the Torah [Numbers 9:4-14], which reads:
åÇéÀãÇáÌÅø îÉùÑÆä àÆìÎáÌÀðÅé éÄùÒÀøÈàÅì ìÇÍòÂùÒú äÇôÌÈñÇç: ...
åÇéÀäÄé àÂðÈùÑÄéí àÂùÑÆø äÈéåÌ èÀîÅàÄéí ìÀðÆôÆùÑ àÈãÈí åÀìÉàÎéÈëÀìåÌ ìÇÍòÂùÒÉúÎäÇôÌÆñÇç áÌÇéÌåÉí äÇäåÌà
åÇéÌÄ÷ÀøÀáåÌ ìÄôÀðÅé îÉùÑÆä åÀìÄôÀðÅé àÇÍäÂøÉï áÌÇéÌåÉí äÇäåÌà:
åÇéÌÉàîÀøåÌ äÈÍàÂðÈùÑÄéí äÈäÅîÌÈä àÅìÈéå àÂðÇçÀðåÌ èÀîÅàÄéí ìÀðÆôÆùÑ àÈãÈí
ìÈîÌÈä ðÄâÌÈøÇò ìÀáÄìÀúÌÄé äÇ÷ÀøÄéá àÆúÎ÷ÈøÀáÌÇï éÀäåÉÈä áÌÀîÉòÂãåÉ áÌÀúåÉêÀ áÌÀðÅé éÄùÒÀøÈàÅì: ...
åÇéÀãÇáÌÅø éÀäåÉÈä àÆìÎîÉùÑÆä ìÌÅàîÉø:
ãÌÇáÌÅø àÆìÎáÌÀðÅé éÄùÒÀøÈàÅì ìÅàîÉø
àÄéùÑ àÄéùÑ ëÌÄéÎéÄÍäÀéÆä èÈîÅà ìÈðÆôÆùÑ àåÉ áÀãÆøÆêÀ øÀçÉ÷Èä ìÈëÆí àåÉ ìÀãÉøÉúÅéëÆí
åÀòÈùÒÈä ôÆñÇç ìÇéäåÉÈÍä:
áÌÇçÉãÆùÑ äÇùÌÑÅðÄé áÌÀàÇøÀáÌÈòÈä òÈùÒÈø éåÉí áÌÅéï äÈÍòÇøÀáÌÇéÄí éÇòÂùÒåÌ àÉúåÉ
òÇìÎîÇöÌåÉú åÌîÀøÉøÄéí éÍÉàëÀìËäåÌ:
Moses instructed the Israelites to offer the passover sacrifice... But there were some men who were
unclean by reason of a corpse and could not offer the passover sacrifice on that day. Appearing that same
day before Moses and Aaron, those men said to them, 'Unclean though we are by reason of a corpse, why
must we be debarred from presenting God's offering at its set time with the rest of the Israelites?'
... And God spoke to Moses, saying: Speak to the Israelite people, saying: When any of you or of
your posterity who are defiled by a corpse or are on a long journey would offer a passover sacrifice to
God, they shall offer it in the second month, on the fourteenth day of the month, at twilight...
Since specific provision is made for an alternative Passover on Iyyar 14th for those who were ritually
impure on Nisan 14th it must imply that those ritually impure may not be be initial subscribers to a
lamb. DISCUSSION:
Concerning a translation in this shiur Ze'ev Orzech asks: What is the reason for transliterating 'aviv'
as 'abib'? I respond: For several years I gave my own translations of biblical (and rabbinic) texts; recently, however, I started quoting biblical texts from the translation of the Jewish Publication Society. I am beginning to wonder whether that was a wise decision, since often that translation does not reflect the understanding of the biblical text that the sages had. Since almost invariably the biblical quotations are brought by the rabbinical sources in order to justify a ruling of the sages it seems more sensible to quote these passages in a translation that reflects their reading of the text. A case in point is the mishnah that is the subject of our present shiur. The sages understood the Hebrew Beyn ha-Arbayyim [Exodus 12:6] as referring to 'afternoon' and not 'twilight'. Your comments are welcomed. Another case in point in our present mishnah is what the JPS translated as 'contribute', which the sages understood as meaning 'subscribe'. EXPLANATIONS (continued):
5: We note that there is a surprising difference between the statement of the previous mishnah and the present one. The reason why the paschal lamb is invalidated when it is not slaughtered for that specific purpose, as stated in mishnah 2, is that - as in the case of all sacrifices that are within the category of Kodashim - it is not only the act of slaughter itself which validates or invalidates the sacrifice, but the intention of the slaughterer has the same effect. Our present mishnah refers to four kinds of people who, even if they eat of the paschal lamb, have not fulfilled the mitzvah. They are, as already detailed by us, those who cannot eat even the minimal amount of the meat, those who are uncircumcised, those who are ritually impure, and those who were not subscribed to this particular lamb. A lamb which was slaughtered specifically for a party which consisted only of such people is invalid. The reason why our present mishnah validates a lamb which was slaughtered for a party which included both qualified and unqualified participants is that the participation of the unqualified people does not affect the legitimacy of the lamb for those qualified to eat it: it is not a question of intention, but of consequence.
6:
7:
DISCUSSION:
We return to the problem of translation. Ze'ev Orzech writes: I agree with your sentiments about translations. All too often, to paraphrase Robert Frost speaking of poetry, the meaning 'is what gets lost in translation.' However, I am still puzzled by the practice of transliterating the letter 'veit' as a 'B' (as in abib, negeb, nebo, etc. etc.). Where does that come from? I respond: This is standard non-Jewish transliteration. Look at any biblical name: Batsheva becomes Bathsheba, Kalev becomes Caleb, Rechav'am becomes Rehoboam... To this day, scholarly non-Jews pronounce Hebrew in this way.
Albert Ringer writes: I remember there was a discussion some time ago on the question if the Pesaĥ-sacrifice was done outside or after the Beth Hamikdash was destroyed. I stumbled on a book by Baruch M. Bokser, a Neusner pupil, called The Origins of the Seder. The Passover Rite and Early Rabbinic Judaism, Berkeley 1984... Appendix A is called Roasted meat or sacrifices after 70 CE?. The writer brings together six texts from the Mishnah and Tosephta that speak on the subject... The texts tell us that roasted meat is permissible on Pesaĥ, as long as any confusion on the status of the meat is taken away. It should be a either a calf and not a lamb, or not roasted as a whole. The impression is given that there was a need to stress the difference. Most clear on the subject is a text from the Tosephta, 2:15 that reads: ... Said R. Yoah, Todos of Rome directed the Romans to take lambs on the nights of Passover and they prepared them roasted whole. They said to him, And he borders on feeding them holy things outside, because they called them Pesaĥin. One might read that the Jews of Rome did what Shemot requires them to do: slaughter an animal in each Jewish house as a Pesaĥ. As the text tells us, the sages knew and didn't like it. I respond (briefly): Whether or not the paschal lamb was eaten outside Jerusalem was discussed by us in Pesaĥim 3 and 6. In Pesaĥim 6 Naomi Koltun-Fromm described a particular way of roasting associated (possibly) with the paschal lamb. As the Tosefta quoted above indicates the sages frowned an any ceremonial that suggested an imitation of the sacrifice of the paschal lamb; they certainly would have disapproved of such a sacrifice in Rome or elsewhere outside Jerusalem, since the Torah itself [Deuteronomy 16:5-6] specifically requires the paschal lamb to be slaughtered 'in the place which God chooses'. In Deuteronomy this is synonymous with 'Jerusalem'.
äÇùÌÑåÉçÅè àÆú äÇôÌÆñÇç òÇì äÆçÈîÅõ, òåÉáÅø áÌÀìÉà úÇòÂùÒÆä.
øÇáÌÄé éÀäåÌãÈä àåÉîÅø, àÇó äÇúÌÈîÄéã.
øÇáÌÄé ùÑÄîÀòåÉï àåÉîÅø, äÇôÌÆñÇç áÌÀàÇøÀáÌÈòÈä òÈùÒÈø, ìÄùÑÀîåÉ çÇéÌÈá, åÀùÑÆìÌÉà ìÄùÑÀîåÉ ôÌÈèåÌø.
åÌùÑÀàÈø ëÌÈì äÇæÌÀáÈçÄéí, áÌÅéï ìÄùÑÀîÈï åÌáÅéï ùÑÆìÌÉà ìÄùÑÀîÈï, ôÌÈèåÌø.
åÌáÇîÌåÉòÅã, ìÄùÑÀîåÉ ôÌÈèåÌø, åÀùÑÆìÌÉà ìÄùÑÀîåÉ çÇéÌÈá,
åÌùÑÀàÈø ëÌÈì äÇæÌÀáÈçÄéí, áÌÅéï ìÄùÑÀîÈï åÌáÅéï ùÑÆìÌÉà ìÄùÑÀîÈï, çÇéÌÈá,
çåÌõ îÄï äÇçÇèÌÈàú ùÑÆùÌÑÀçÈèÈäÌ ùÑÆìÌÉà ìÄùÑÀîÈäÌ:
If someone slaughters his paschal lamb with ĥametz he is contravening a negative commandment. Rabbi
Yehudah says, Even the Daily Sacrifice. Rabbi Shim'on says that if one slaughtered a paschal lamb, for
that purpose, on [Nisan] 14th he is liable, but if it was not for that
purpose he is excused. With regards to all other sacrifices, whether they were for their specific purpose
or not, one is excused. If one slaughters it during the festival for that purpose he is excused, but
otherwise one is liable. With regards to all other sacrifices, whether they were for their specific
purpose or not, one is liable with the exception of a sin-offering which one slaughtered for another
purpose.
EXPLANATIONS:
1: The Torah [Exodus 23:18] commands:
ìÉàÎúÄæÀáÌÇç òÇìÎçÈîÅõ ãÌÇíÎæÄáÀçÄé åÀìÉàÎéÈìÄéï çÅìÆáÎçÇâÌÄé òÇãÎáÌÉ÷Æø:
You shall not slaughter my blood sacrifice with ĥametz, nor shall the intestinal fatty parts of my
festive offering be left over until morning.
This command is repeated later on [Exodus 34:25] with a significant change which illuminates the
meaning of the previous command:
ìÉàÎúÄùÑÀçÇè òÇìÎçÈîÅõ ãÌÇíÎæÄáÀçÄé åÀìÉàÎéÈìÄéï ìÇáÌÉ÷Æø æÆáÇç çÇâ äÇôÌÈñÇç:
You shall not slaughter my blood sacrifice with ĥametz, nor shall the intestinal fatty parts of the
paschal sacrifice be left over until morning.
The juxtaposition of these two verses illuminates the meaning of the former. As Rashi (and others)
points out in his Torah commentary on the former verse, the Torah prohibits the slaughter of the paschal
lamb if the owner still possess ĥametz, and this prohibition is the negative command to which our
present mishnah refers. The Tosefta [Pesaĥim 4:4] adds an interesting rider:
äùåçè àú äôñç òì äçîõ áàøáòä òùø òåáø áìà úòùä,
òöîå ëùø åéåöà áå éãé çåáúå áôñç:
If on [Nisan] 14th someone slaughters his paschal lamb with ĥametz he
is contravening a negative commandment, but the lamb itself is valid and he may use it to fulfill his
obligation [to eat the paschal lamb at the Seder].
DISCUSSION:
The previous mishnah mentioned the uncircumcised and the paschal lamb. Sue Mackson writes: I would like to know if this ... bears on the subject of inviting non-Jews to participate in the Seder. A number of years ago I learned that many (?), all (?) observant people exclude non-Jews from the seder. Is this a prohibition that you observe, that you think should be observed? I respond: The mishnah which we were studying has nothing to do with the issue that Sue raises. A moment's thought will indicate that this must be the case. A non-Jew is not commanded to eat of the paschal lamb at all, therefore the legitimacy of including him or not including him in the party of subscribers to a paschal lamb is completely irrelevant. The biblical verse upon which the mishnah bases itself is referring to a Canaanite slave, who is considered a member of the family. During the first year of his servitude he is a non-Jew in all matters; at the end of one year he must decide whether he wishes his Jewish master to sell him off to a non-Jew or whether he wishes to embrace Judaism and remain with his master. If he chooses the latter he must be circumcised and then he becomes liable for observing all negative commandments and those positive commandments which are not linked to a specific time period. In addition, there are certain other positive commandments which he is required to observe, one of them being the eating of the paschal lamb. When Jews ceased owning Canaanite slaves the issue of the uncircumcised became more restricted. Rabbi Ovadyah of Bertinoro, in his classical commentary, refers the mishnah that we are discussing to an uncircumcised Jew. A Jew whose elder brothers died as a result of circumcision (hemophiliacs?) may not be circumcised; therefore, he may not be included among the subscribers to a paschal lamb unless there were also in the party valid subscribers. As regards the modern question of whether or not it is permitted to have non-Jews present at the Seder service: I can see no objection to this. They are present as onlookers because, of course, they are not obligated to observe this ritual at all, and any participatory act that they may or may not do is religiously meaningless. The prohibition against the participation of the uncircumcised in any case was only with regards to the paschal lamb itself, which in this day and age is completely irrelevant.
Our discussion concerning translations and transliterations has produced several comments. The general gist was that it is preferable for me to make my own translations and transliterations. While I shall present some of these messages next week I have already taken the advice and today's shiur includes translations that are my own.
EXPLANATIONS (continued):
2: Rabbi Yehudah ben-Ilai is of the opinion that on Nisan 14th even the Daily Minchah Sacrifice may not be offered while ĥametz is still permitted. His reasoning is also based on the verses that we have already quoted:
You shall not slaughter my blood sacrifice with ĥametz, nor shall the intestinal fatty parts of my
festive offering be left over until morning [Exodus 23:18]. You shall not slaughter my blood sacrifice with ĥametz, nor shall the intestinal fatty parts of the paschal sacrifice be left over until morning. [Exodus 34:25]
He holds that it is the Minchah that is 'my sacrifice', whereas the paschal lamb is 'yours' as it were.
3:
DISCUSSION:
Still in connection with translations, Mike Mantel writes: Isn't all translation interpetation? Since we are studying only redacted texts, they all have already been interpeted? And Moshe acted in the same way. It seems to me, and this may be a drash, that the Torah urges this kind of communication simply because of its literary structure. I respond: In a previous shiur 1988 I presented a long and thorough discussion on the literary origins of Torah. (Since the topic is not really relevant to our present discussion I refrain from reproducing here even part of it.) However, I think we should bear in mind that redaction does not necessarily presume interpretation. It is possible to present original texts and let them speak for themselves. In this sense, I believe that redaction is different from editing. In the matter of substance, I agree that, of course, any translation is an interpretation. The sages themselves agreed with this. The prophet Jeremiah [23:29] said: God says, 'Is not my word like fire, like a hammer splitting rock?' On this text the Gemara [Sanhedrin 34a] comments: Just as the hammer blow emits many sparks so one biblical verse can emit many interpretations. The Talmud of Eretz-Israel [Sanhedrin 22a] went even further: It must be possible to interpret [a biblical verse] with forty-nine interpretations in one direction and another forty-nine in another! However, to return to the substance of Mike's message: my experience - limited as it may be - teaches me that this problem is much more true of translations of texts of the sages, such as Mishnah, than of the text of the written Torah. It is fiendishly difficult to translate even such a simple text as the mishnah which is the basis of this shiur without annotation. I try to leave my translations as ambiguous as is the original, but quite often that is just not possible since English will not permit all the possible nuances of a Hebrew phrase and one must select. Often it then transpires that the discussion in the Gemara is based just on that ambiguity of nuance! Mike continues: You have dealt in depth with the issue of the pesach sacrifice, yet the sedar deals with it only briefly, secondarily. comment? I respond: It is not I who am dealing with the paschal sacrifice in depth; it is the Mishnah! As we shall see much later on the eating of the paschal lamb is only one mitzvah to be observed on the night of Nisan 15th. Another, no less important, is the narration to our children (and everyone is someone's child!) of the wonders of the exodus from Egypt. That 'narration' is now more or less formalized in the 'Haggadah' [= narration]. So it is the narration that only briefly touches on the paschal sacrifice, not the Seder itself which originally included the eating of the paschal lamb. I permit myself to also comment on the salutation which came at the end of Mike's message to me: b'shalom. This is a mistake which I have noticed among many well-meaning American Jews. The correct salutation should be le-shalom. The Gemara [Berakhot 64a] points out that the salutation 'be-shalom' is only used of the deceased or those about to die, whereas the salutation for the living is 'le-shalom'.
On the same topic: I wrote, This is standard non-Jewish transliteration. Look at any biblical name: Batsheva becomes Bathsheba, Kalev becomes Caleb, Rechav'am becomes Rehoboam... To this day, scholarly non-Jews pronounce Hebrew in this way. David Bockman writes: As I undertand it, this practice allows non-Hebrew readers to relate the non-dageshed form of a letter and the dageshed form (oy, that is difficult!). Thus, if shabbat and shavat were transliterated in the way I just wrote them, they would be pronounced correctly, but the people who were reading it would never see the same shoresh [root], because in English 'B' and 'V' are completely separate letters. Thus you'll get 'shabat' for shavat, and 'shabbat' (for the doubling of a dagesh) for shabat. Either way, it pays to know Hebrew.
If I have understood him correctly, Jim Feldman takes the opposite view to that of David Bockman: I will grant you that the goyem have indeed butchered our language, but why should we follow suit? I think that if you use rather standard English use of Roman letters to transliterate Hebrew, we would all be happier. Some of the biblical transliterations are bizarre. How the translators got Zebulon out of 'Zvuloon' I cannot fathom. [I have a cousin from Argentina who lives in Kibbutz Daphna. Our only common tongue is Hebrew but in e-mail, we have to spell it out in Roman letters. He uses Roman letters as a Spaniard would. As a proper anglophile, I say Oi! But it works and is sort of fun. But since both Hebrew and English have both B and V sounds, it is not clear what advantage changing all v's to b's obtains.]
Yiftah Shapir writes on this same topic: It is interesting to note that a great scholar of the Hebrew language, Prof. Tur-Sinai (Tortchiner), in his book Ha-Lashon ve-ha-Sefer (Vol I pp. 147-152), is of the opinion that in the period of the first temple all 6 letters were hard = bet, gimel, dalet, kaf, peh and tav were - B, G, D, K, P, T. He then says that during the period of the second temple pronounciation changed, to agree with the pronounciation of the Babylonians: bet, gimel and dalet always hard, (B, G, D ), whereas kaf peh and tav were always soft (Kh, Ph, Th ). He thinks that only when Jews began to speak Aramaic, each letter aquired both a soft and a hard pronounciation. So - the non Jewish prononciation has some basis: if he is right - then our ancestors did pronouce it Abib rather than Aviv - although it is possible that by the time the Mishna was written - people already pronounced it Aviv...
äÇôÌÆñÇç ðÄùÑÀçÈè áÌÀùÑÈìÉùÑ ëÌÄúÌåÉú, ùÑÆðÌÆàÁîÇø åÀùÑÈçÂèåÌ àÉúåÉ ëÌÉì ÷ÀäÇì òÂãÇú éÄùÒÀøÈàÅì,
÷ÈäÈì åÀòÅãÈä åÀéÄùÒÀøÈàÅì.
ðÄëÀðÀñÈä ëÌÇú äÈøÄàùÑåÉðÈä, ðÄúÀîÇìÌÅàú äÈòÂæÈøÈä, ðÈòÂìåÌ ãÇìÀúåÉú äÈòÂæÈøÈä.
úÌÈ÷ÀòåÌ åÀäÅøÄéòåÌ åÀúÈ÷ÀòåÌ.
äÇëÌÉäÂðÄéí òåÉîÀãÄéí ùÑåÌøåÉú ùÑåÌøåÉú, åÌáÄéãÅéäÆí áÌÈæÄéëÅé ëÆñÆó åÌáÈæÄéëÅé æÈäÈá.
ùÑåÌøÈä ùÑÆëÌËìÌÈä ëÌÆñÆó ëÌÆñÆó, åÀùÑåÌøÈä ùÑÆëÌËìÌÈäÌ æÈäÈá æÈäÈá.
ìÉà äÈéåÌ îÀòåÉøÈáÄéï.
åÀìÉà äÈéåÌ ìÇáÌÈæÄéëÄéï ùÑåÌìÇéÄí, ùÑÆîÌÈà éÇðÌÄéçåÌí åÀéÄ÷ÀøÇùÑ äÇãÌÈí:
The paschal lamb is slaughtered in three groups, for it says 'the whole community of the congregation of
Israel shall slaughter it' - community, congregation and Israel. The first group would come in, the
courtyard would be filled and the doors of the courtyard would be closed. They would sound Teki'ah-Teru'ah
-Teki'ah. The priests would be standing in many lines holding basins of silver and gold: one line
entirely silver, one line entirely of gold; nor were they mixed. The basins had no base so that they
could not be set down [since] thus the blood would congeal.
EXPLANATIONS:
1: With our present mishnah we come to the details of the logistics of the actual slaughter of the paschal lamb. The Gemara [Pesaĥim 64b] tells us that on one occasion King Agrippa, who reigned between 40-44 CE, wished to know how many people actually visited the Bet Mikdash on these occasions (probably for security purposes). Since it is forbidden to make a direct count of Jews he instructed the High Priest to take the kidneys from each lamb. When this harvest was counted it was found to contain six hundred thousand pairs of kidneys! The Gemara itself recognizes that this is a typological number: the bible tells us that 600,000 Israelites left Egypt. Be that as it may, it obviously indicates 'a lot of people'. Our present mishnah describes the arrangements that the management of the Bet Mikdash made for dealing with such large numbers of people, who all needed to be attended to within a very limited time frame.
DISCUSSION:
I wrote a response concerning the presence of non-Jews at the seder service. Art Werschulz writes: I have heard the following explanation for not inviting non-Jews to the seder: On Yom Tov, it is permissible to cook for Jews, but not for non-Jews. Hence, one should not invite non-Jews to the seder, lest one come to cook something specifically for the non-Jew (e.g., boil water for a hot beverage specifically for the non-Jew). FWIW, I don't think that such an eventuality is very likely, given that most people tend to cook food by the vatfull for their sedarim! However (assuming that the concern is valid, which I'm not in a position to determine), this might be a case of lo p'lug. In addition, there's also the issue that certain passages (e.g., sh'foch when we open the door for Eliyahu) may be rather uncomfortable in the presence of a non-Jew. This gets us to the question of to what extent Pesaĥ is particularistic (freeing b'nei Yisrael from Egypt to serve God) and to what extent it's universalistic (people deserve religious freedom). This balancing act might be another determining factor. OTOH (we're maybe up to three hands now?), I would imagine that YA mitigating factor would be inviting an intermarried couple, or an interdating couple in which the non-Jewish partner is seriously interested in conversion, or (for that matter) any non-Jew who's considering gerut. YMMV, CYLHA (consult your local halachic authority), and all that. I respond: I agree with Art that the argument concerning the preparation of food on YomTov is a very weak one indeed. In order to clarify this matter for those who may not understand it let me briefly explain. On Shabbat we are forbidden by the Torah to cook anything: all food must be prepared before the beginning of Shabbat. As regards YomTov, however, the Torah [Exodus 12:16] makes a distinction: The first and seventh days you shall decree as holy days on which no work shall be done: but what each person needs to eat, that alone shall be done by you... It is permitted to cook food on YomTov - but only food intended for consumption on that day. (Food left over may certainly be eaten after YomTov, but it is forbidden to cook food on YomTov that will be eaten entirely after the festival.) It is certainly permitted to let non-Jews share food that has been cooked for Jews on YomTov. Assuming that the non-Jews are healthy and in no danger, it is not permitted to cook food especially and only for them on YomTov, since the cooking was permitted on YomTov only for the sake of the Jews celebrating; by definition, non-Jews are not required to celebrate the festivals. It becomes immediately clear that the argument about cooking for non-Jews on YomTov is merely a lame justification for not inviting non-Jews to the Seder. The argument of 'lo pelug' to which Art refers is the principle that when the sages permit or prohibit something that prohibition is blanket with no exceptions intended. One could just as easily use that argument in the opposite direction: since the Torah permits cooking for Jews it does not exclude cooking for non-Jews. However, the argument of 'lo pelug' never refers to Torah legislation, only rabbinic. If a Jewish host feels that non-Jewish guests might be embarrassed by certain passages in the Haggadah he or she would know better than to invite them. Certainly no changes should be made in the traditional Haggadah simply to avoid embarrassing non-Jews who will be present. If a candidate for conversion might object to the negative reference to non-Jews in the Haggadah he or she should perhaps reconsider whether they really want to join our people.
EXPLANATIONS (continued):
2: Clearly, it was not possible to accommodate at one and the same time all the people who had brought their lambs to the Bet Mikdash. However, it seems that there was a lingering feeling that the paschal lamb was to be slaughtered by all Israel at the same time. This feeling was engendered, it seems, by the plain meaning of the verse actually quoted by our mishnah: 'it [the paschal lamb, and not the paschal lambs] shall be slaughtered by the whole community of the congregation of Israel'. However, practical considerations made it necessary to overcome this primal feeling. In order to justify the division of the people into groups that could be accommodated by the facility - the Courtyard of the Priests - the verse was happily re-interpreted: 'it [the paschal lamb of each individual present] shall be slaughtered by the whole community [first group] of the congregation [second group] of Israel [third group]'. As we shall see later on, the masses were always accommodated by only three groups.
3:
4:
DISCUSSION:
In a previous mishnah we noted that a paschal lamb was not invalidated by the presence in the subscription
group of people who were not entitled to eat of its meat. Albert Ringer writes: I suppose that the rationale behind the Mishnah's ruling is, that the individual member of a group should not find it necessary to check the ritual status of the other members. As long as he knows he is allowed to participate, the Pesaĥ is valid. If I understand the mishnah well, it is more lenient then the Torah, the Torah states that non-circumcised strangers are not allowed to eat Pesaĥ. The Mishnah does not invalidate the sacrifice and so effectively makes it possible for non-circumcised to be part of a group. I respond: In both cases I think that Albert's assumptions are not borne out by the sources. Firstly, the classical commentators assume that the presence of 'invalid participants' will be noted by the valid members of the subscription group and they will see to it that those not entitled to share the roast lamb will not do so. Secondly, I have already pointed out that the rule of the Torah prohibiting the uncircumcised from participating was directed by our classical commentators to full Jews who had not been circumcised for perfectly valid halakhic reasons and to Canaanite servants who had not yet been circumcised but were considered as part of the family.
ùÑÈçÇè éÄùÒÀøÈàÅì åÀ÷ÄáÌÅì äÇëÌÉäÅï,
ðåÉúÀðåÉ ìÇçÂáÅøåÉ åÇçÂáÅøåÉ ìÇçÂáÅøåÉ,
åÌîÀ÷ÇáÌÅì àÆú äÇîÌÈìÅà åÌîÇçÂæÄéø àÆú äÈøÅé÷Èï.
ëÌÉäÅï äÇ÷ÌÈøåÉá àÅöÆì äÇîÌÄæÀáÌÅçÇ æåÉøÀ÷åÉ æÀøÄé÷Èä àÇçÇú ëÌÀðÆâÆã äÇéÀñåÉã:
An Israelite would slaughter [the paschal lamb] and a priest would
receive [its blood]. This he would pass on to his colleague
[who would pass it on] to his colleague who would receive a full one
and return an empty one. The priest nearest the altar would sprinkle it in one
[movement] towards the base.
EXPLANATIONS:
1: Our mishnah continues with the logistics of the slaughter of the paschal lamb. Let us imagine that we are one of the people bringing their lamb for slaughter. We represent a group of people (probably around 10) who had joined together to subscribe to this lamb and we will all get together this evening to eat the lamb roasted as part of our Seder service. (It is this lamb which is symbolically represented at our Seder today by the shankbone.) As we come through the Nicanor gate we have the enormous building of the sanctuary ahead of us at the far end of the priests' court. To our left is the huge main altar and to our right are the tables, slabs and posts which are the accoutrements of the place of slaughtering. Between the place of slaughtering and the altar rows of priests are arranged, ready to act like a conveyer belt.
2:
DISCUSSION:
Some time back Mike Mantel mentioned in passing the seeming fixation of our tractate on the sacrifice of
the paschal lamb, and I responded to his comment. Now Amit Gevaryahu writes: I. J. Yuval, in his new book (in Hebrew) 'Shnei Goyim Be-Vitnekh', explains the mixup in the mishnah, and its general focus on sacrificial issues. It seems that this was the main focus of passover, and even after the Ĥurban it continued to be so, for the tosefta tells us our favorite story about the sages in Bnei Braq, except that they were discussing the sacrifice. The story in the mishnah is probably there to endorse a new custom, intended to polemicize with the christian custom of recreating christ's suffering on Easter - which used to be identical with passover. I respond: The Tosefta does not tell 'our favourite story about the sages in Bnei Braq'. The reference in all probability is to Tosefta Pesaĥim 10:8, where there are similarities, but the differences are many - different sages, different place, different topic and so forth.
In our last shiur I wrote: Clearly, it was not possible to accommodate at one and the same time all the people who had brought their lambs to the Bet Mikdash... In order to justify the division of the people into groups that could be accommodated by the facility - the Courtyard of the Priests - the verse was happily re-interpreted... the masses were always accommodated by only three groups. Ed Frankel writes: Is there not a tradition that one of the ongoing miracles of the Bet Hamikdash was that it managed to have the capacity to fit all who needed to be there without overcrowding? I respond: Ed's memory fails him here. His source (which we once quoted in a similar context is in Tractate Avot 5:5, which reads: no person ever said there is no room for me to stay in Jerusalem. Jerusalem, not the Bet Mikdash.
éÈöÀúÈä ëÌÇú øÄàùÑåÉðÈä åÀðÄëÀðÀñÈä ëÌÇú ùÑÀðÄéÌÈä.
éÈöÀúÈä ùÑÀðÄéÌÈä, ðÄëÀðÀñÈä ùÑÀìÄéùÑÄéú.
ëÌÀîÇòÂùÒÅä äÈøÄàùÑåÉðÈä ëÌÈêÀ îÇòÂùÒÅä äÇùÌÑÀðÄéÌÈä åÀäÇùÌÑÀìÄéùÑÄéú.
÷ÈøÀàåÌ àÆú äÇäÇìÌÅì.
àÄí âÌÈîÀøåÌ ùÑÈðåÌ, åÀàÄí ùÑÈðåÌ ùÑÄìÌÅùÑåÌ, àÇó òÇì ôÌÄé ùÑÆìÌÉà ùÑÄìÌÀùÑåÌ îÄéîÅéäÆí.
øÇáÌÄé éÀäåÌãÈä àåÉîÅø,
îÄéîÅéäÆí ùÑÆì ëÌÇú ùÑÀìÄéùÑÄéú ìÉà äÄâÌÄéòÇ ìÀàÈäÇáÀúÌÄé ëÌÄé éÄùÑÀîÇò ä',
îÄôÌÀðÅé ùÑÆòÇîÌÈäÌ îËòÈèÄéï:
When the first group had vacated [the priests' court] the second group
would enter; when the second group left the third group entered. Whatever the first group did so also
did the second and third groups. They recited Hallel. If they completed it
[before all the lambs had been slaughtered] they recited it a second
time and even a third (though it never happened that they had to do it a third time). Rabbi Yehudah says
that the third group never reached 'ahavti ki yishma' because there were not so many people
[in that group].
EXPLANATIONS:
1: The procedure that we described in our previous shiur was repeated for both the second and the third groups, who were waiting in the Women's Court with their lambs until the previous group had gone.
2:
The offering of the Tamid was accompanied by the singing of the Levitical choir, which stood on the
platform which was at the Nicanor Gate in the Womens' Court... The singing was accompanied by the
playing of an orchestra. According to the mishnah [Arakhin 2:3]
this orchestra had a variable number of players: ... no less than two harps and no more than six; no
less than two flutes and no more than twelve...
3: Hallel is still a major element in our liturgy. It consists of Psalms 113 - 118. As we shall see when we reach chapter 10, Hallel also accompanied the eating of the paschal lamb as part of the meal of the Seder service. That is why we still recite Hallel at our Seder service; we divide it into two parts so that the meal is sandwiched inside Hallel, as it were.
4:
DISCUSSION:
Recently we had reason to mention the sounding of the shofar in the Bet Mikdash on Nisan 14th.
Mike Mantel writes: Any sense of how we lost the shofar on Pesaĥ? I respond: As a mitzvah the shofar is only sounded (nowadays) on Rosh ha-Shanah. As a custom the shofar was sounded regularly in the Bet Mikdash - not just on Rosh ha-Shanah and not just on the day before Pesaĥ. Shofarot were sounded every single day, twice a day! When we studied tractate Tamid I wrote: Apart from the trumpets, cymbals, harps and flutes already mentioned the Shofar was sounded daily in the Bet Mikdash. The main function of the Shofar was to signal. According to the mishnah [Sukkah 5:5] the Shofar was sounded three times to announce the opening of gates, nine times during the offering of the Tamid, and a further nine times when the sacrifice was repeated in the afternoon. On special occasions there were even more Teki'ot. (A stone has been discovered with the words 'To the Shofar Sounding Room' cut into it.) So the sounding of the shofar, apart from Rosh ha-Shanah, was never a part of synagogue ritual. The vestigial sounding of the shofar at the end of Yom Kippur is pure custom (and late), as we noted when we studied tractate Rosh ha-Shanah.
Still with Mike Mantel! I permitted myself a comment about the different meaning the sages attributed to the salutation be-shalom" and le-shalom". Arnie Kuzmack writes: This may reflect the usage in Talmudic times, but our usage is influenced by Yiddish. According to Weinreich's standard dictionary, b'sholem means 'intact, safely, unharmed' in Yiddish. It does not even list l'sholem. For that matter, in modern colloquial Israeli Hebrew, would you say hu xazar mehamilxamah b'shalom or l'shalom? I respond: The term 'be-shalom' has exactly the meaning that Arnie ascribes to it except when it is used as a salutation. As a salutation, even in modern Israel, the term 'le-shalom' is correctly used in connection with a greeting (hu beyrakh otah le-shalom, he greeted her).
ëÌÀîÇòÂùÒÅäåÌ áÇçÉì ëÌÈêÀ îÇòÂùÒÅäåÌ áÇùÌÑÇáÌÈú,
àÆìÌÈà ùÑÆäÇëÌÉäÂðÄéí îÀãÄéçÄéí àÆú äÈòÂæÈøÈä ùÑÆìÌÉà áÄøÀöåÉï çÂëÈîÄéí.
øÇáÌÄé éÀäåÌãÈä àåÉîÅø,
ëÌåÉñ äÈéÈä îÀîÇìÌÅà îÄãÌÇí äÇúÌÇòÂøåÉáåÉú,
æÀøÈ÷åÉ æÀøÄé÷Èä àÇçÇú òÇì âÌÇáÌÅé äÇîÌÄæÀáÌÅçÇ, åÀìÉà äåÉãåÌ ìåÉ çÂëÈîÄéí:
The procedure followed on a weekday was also the procedure followed on Shabbat, except that the priests
would swab down the courtyard, which the sages did not approve of. Rabbi Yehudah says that
[a priest] would fill a cup full of the blood and sprinkle it once on
the altar, but the sages did not agree with him.
EXPLANATIONS:
1: The procedure described in the preceding mishnayot was the one followed regardless of the day of the week. If Nisan 14th fell on a Shabbat there was no deviation from the procedure outlined. The sages were of the opinion that the priestly tradition was erroneous that this included the swabbing down of the priestly courtyard.
2:
3:
4: A priest stood by us and as we slit the lamb's throat and the blood gushes out this priest collects the lifeblood in the silver or golden bowl that he is holding. This bowl he swiftly passes on to the priest standing next to him, who passes it on down the row of priests until it reaches the priest standing nearest to the altar. This last splashes the blood on the side of the altar, with one swift movement, gauged to that the blood would splash on the base of the altar. The halakhah does not follow the opinion of Rabbi Yehudah.
DISCUSSION:
I responded to a message by Ed Frankel that his memory had failed him as regards the fact that no one
ever complained that there was not enough room for him in the Bet Mikdash (the reference was to Jerusalem
as a whole and not just to the Bet Mikdash). Two people have sprung to defend Ed's honour! Saul Davis writes: I think that Ed Frankel was slightly less mistaken than you said. There was a miracle regarding the Beth Hamiqdash which is in Avoth 5,5: 'omdim tsefoofim, wemishtaxawim rewaxim ( = people stood tightly packed and kneeled down with room'). I do not think there was any kneeling to do during the qorban pesax procedures, but there is this nice reference about the Beth Hamiqdish's 'capacity to fit all who needed to be there without overcrowding'. And Art Werschultz writes in similar fashion: The mishnah in Chapter 5 of Avot mentions ten miracles that were performed for our ancestors in the Beit Hamikdash. The eighth is om'dim tz'fufim, umishtachavim r'vachim, 'they stood crowded together, yet they had enough space to prostrate themselves'. I respond: When we discussed this mishnah in the course of our study of tractate Tamid we suggested that the miracle of having enough room to prostrate oneself was in connection with Yom Kippur and the miracle of never running out of room to stay in Jerusalem was in connection with Pesaĥ. I agree that this is just a surmise, and I certainly cannot gainsay what has been said above.
ëÌÅéöÇã úÌåÉìÄéï åÌîÇôÀùÑÄéèÄéï,
àËðÀ÷ÀìÈéåÉú ùÑÆì áÌÇøÀæÆì äÈéåÌ ÷ÀáåÌòÄéí áÌÇëÌÀúÈìÄéí åÌáÈòÇîÌåÌãÄéí ùÑÆáÌÈäÆï úÌåÉìÄéï åÌîÇôÀùÑÄéèÄéï.
åÀëÈì îÄé ùÑÆàÅéï ìåÉ îÈ÷åÉí ìÄúÀìåÉú åÌìÀäÇôÀùÑÄéè,
îÇ÷ÀìåÉú ãÌÇ÷ÌÄéí çÂìÈ÷Äéí äÈéåÌ ùÑÈí,
åÌîÇðÌÄéçÇ òÇì ëÌÀúÅôåÉ åÀòÇì ëÌÆúÆó çÂáÅøåÉ, åÀúåÉìÆä åÌîÇôÀùÑÄéè.
øÇáÌÄé àÁìÄéòÆæÆø àåÉîÅø,
àÇøÀáÌÈòÈä òÈùÒÈø ùÑÆçÈì ìÄäÀéåÉú áÌÇùÌÑÇáÌÈú, îÇðÌÄéçÇ éÈãåÉ òÇì ëÌÆúÆó çÂáÅøåÉ, åÀéÇã çÂáÅøåÉ òÇì ëÌÀúÅôåÉ, åÀúåÉìÆä åÌîÇôÀùÑÄéè:
How did one suspend and skin [the lamb]? There were iron hooks fixed
into the walls and the posts on which [the carcasses] were suspended
and skinned. Anyone who had no room to suspend and skin [his lamb could use]
the smooth small sticks that were there. He would rest it on his shoulder and on someone else's shoulder
and thus suspend it and skin it. Rabbi Eli'ezer says that when [Nisan]
14th fell on Shabbat [the owner of the lamb] would rest his hand on
someone else's shoulder, who [in turn] would rest his hand on the
shoulder [of the owner], and thus he would suspend it and skin it.
EXPLANATIONS:
1: Our mishnah describes what happens to the lamb after it has been slaughtered and its blood splashed on the side of the altar. The owner of the lamb would now have to suspend it in order to be able to skin it. In order to understand more easily (an understanding that our mishnah takes for granted) we can recall what we learned when studying tractate Tamid. Mishnah Tamid 3:5 reads (in part):
The slaughterhouse was to the north of the altar. After it were eight miniature posts. These had slabs
of cedarwood and had iron hooks fixed into them. Each of them had three sets and they would suspend it
on them and skin it onto marble tables that were between the posts.
In my explanations of that mishnah I wrote:
Eight small posts were fixed into the floor of the Court, between the rings and the far wall. Rambam, in
his commentary on our present mishnah, writes: ...short posts with cedarwood bases - i.e. wide, thick slabs.
Each post was fitted with three hooks. These were used to suspend the carcasses while they were skinned
and dismembered. These iron hooks were either one on top of the other so as to accommodate animals of
various sizes, or they were placed on three sides of the post so that more than one person could be at
work.
2:
3:
4:
DISCUSSION:
A couple of days ago I wrote: 'In his commentary on our mishnah [Pesaĥim 64a] Rashi says that what
Rabbi Yehudah means is that the levites never managed to get further than Psalm 116:1 even the first time
through! I find this very hard to accept - unless, of course, the singing was very slow and the
slaughtering very fast'. Richley Crapo writes: Either way, unless I've missed something, we seem to be talking about a relatively small percentage of the total population participating in having a lamb sacrificed at the Temple. What is your estimate of the possible number of sacrifices that were made in preparation for the Seder? I respond: Oh dear! I had hoped that such a question would not be asked, because I have been pondering it myself for some time and have no answer so far. On the one hand there are indications both inside and outside the Mishnah that there were enormous numbers of people involved; on the other hand the logistics seem to indicate otherwise. So I ask your advice here. What parameters could we use to arrive at a suggested number? - the number of people who could be crammed into the physical limits of the priestly courtyard, perhaps? Please send me your suggestions. It is clear that there were a lot of people present: how does one arrive at a reasonable definition of 'a lot' in this context?
÷ÀøÈòåÉ åÀäåÉöÄéà àÅîåÌøÈéå, ðÀúÈðåÉ áÇîÌÈâÄéñ åÀäÄ÷ÀèÄéøÈï òÇì âÌÇáÌÅé äÇîÌÄæÀáÌÅçÇ.
éÈöÀúÈä ëÌÇú øÄàùÑåÉðÈä åÀéÈùÑÀáÈä ìÈäÌ áÌÀäÇø äÇáÌÇéÄú,
ùÑÀðÄéÌÈä áÇçÅéì, åÀäÇùÌÑÀìÄéùÑÄéú áÌÄîÀ÷åÉîÈäÌ òåÉîÆãÆú.
çÈùÑÅëÈä, éÈöÀàåÌ åÀöÈìåÌ àÆú ôÌÄñÀçÅéäÆï:
He would tear it open and remove its internal organs. He would place it on a salver and burn it on the
altar. The first group would exit and sit down on the Temple Mount; the second group on the Promenade
and the third group would remain where they were. As darkness fell they would leave and roast their
paschal lambs.
EXPLANATIONS:
1: There are two distinct parts to this, the last mishnah of Chapter 5, and it seems that each part is to be understood as dealing with a different situation. (In this interpretation I am following Rashi and Rambam.) The Reisha [first part] of our mishnah is concerned with the treatment of the paschal lambs on any and every day of the week, whereas the Seifa [last part] of our mishnah is concerned only with what happened if Nisan 14th fell on a Shabbat.
2:
He did not break the [animal's] foot, but pierced it at the knee and
suspended it. He would skin it downwards until he reached the breast... Then he completed the skinning.
He tore out the heart and removed its blood... Now he ripped [the breast]
open and everything was visible before him. He removed the suet... Now he removed the guts...
3: The subject, 'he' of the first two sentences of our present mishnah, is different in each case. The meaning is as follows: the owner of the lamb would slaughter it, suspend it, skin it and remove the relevant internal organs. These internal organs he would put on a salver held by an attendant priest who would then take them and burn them on the main altar. In his commentary on our present mishnah Rambam identifies the organs that were separated off for incineration on the altar as being: the tail, the fat surrounding the intestines, the kidneys together with their fat and the protuberance of the liver.
4:
5:
6:
DISCUSSION:
I have received a very important message from Jim Feldman, and my response will follow. I am sure that
Jim's question, or comment, has been on the mind of many participants and it is worthy of a full treatment
on my part. In order to enable people to collect their own thoughts before reading mine, here is Jim's
message to me: As a vegetarian I find this image of slaughter distinctly unpalatable but understandable at a primitive level, but as a Jew, I cannot understand carrying out this butchering on Shabbat. Being squeamish about holding up a pole on shabbat while you are killing, gutting and skinning an animal? This seems to me to require an impenetrable wall between reason and action. You express great distress about someone igniting some fossil fuel on Shabbat (driving) while not even discussing the whole population participating in a slaughter on the sacred day in which 'neither thy maidservant nor thy manservant nor thy ox nor thy ass' is supposed to labor. How can anyone rationalize this behavior or the rabbinical pontification on it? Give me Isaiah (1:11): 'To what purpose is the multitude of your sacrifices unto Me? Saith the Lord; I am full of the burnt-offerings of rams, and the fat of fed beasts; And I delight not in the blood of bullocks, or of lambs, or of he-goats' - to which I add: Amen. I respond: Dear Jim, I am not a vegetarian; I am a vegan. This means that in addition to refraining from eating dead animals I also refrain from consuming the natural (and processed) products of animals such as eggs and milk (and cheese). Our discussion concerning the gory details of the sacrifice of the paschal lamb is only one of the topics treated in Tractate Pesaĥim. Where were you, Jim, with this question when we studied Tractate Tamid which was concerned with the sacrificial cult exclusively? I think that a careful reading of my treatment of the sacrificial system in both tractates will reveal that I have never tried to conceal the gore; on the contrary, almost invariably I have used terms and translations that emphasize the problematica to modern susceptibilities of killing animals for worship. I shall address your comments concerning Shabbat later on. But before doing so I want to address two other points that arise from your message. Firstly, many great rabbis (far, far, far greater than me) have been or are vegetarian or vegan and many more have shown great sympathy for the vegetarian way of life. Among them we may include Rabbi Avraham Kuk the first Chief Rabbi of the holy land; there was also Rabbi Shelomo Goren who was chief rabbi of IDF and later Ashkenazi chief rabbi of Israel; we may add the present chief rabbi of Haifa and there are more. Rabbi Kuk wrote that when Mashiaĥ comes everyone will be vegetarian. I shall return to the historical aspect later. let me say at this juncture that I feel that the great issue for Conservative Judaism today is not how we relate to the sacrificial system of the past, but to the sacrificial system of the future. I devoted great thought to this issue when I edited the Musaf service for the Siddur Va'ani Tefillati for the Masorti Movement. I once quoted in one of our shiurim: This siddur was published for the use of Masorti Jews in Israel: it is, as far as I know, the only Conservative Siddur ever published which contains not one word of English. Here is an expurgated rendition into English of the relevant material:
The fourth Berakhah of the Amidah on Shabbat and Yom Tov is termed
by the sages 'Kedushat ha-Yom' (the sanctity of the day). When the Bet Mikdash was still standing, on
those days on which nowadays we recite the Musaf (additional) Amidah they would offer the special
sacrifices for that day. Since the destruction of the Bet Mikdash the Musaf Amidah contained a prayer for
the rebuilding of the Temple and the restoration of its sacrificial cultus; and within the Berakhah
'Kedushat ha-Yom' specific mention was made to the particular sacrifices associated with that day,
quoting them from the text of the Torah. Few in the Masorti Movement today hope for the restoration of
the sacrificial system at some time in the future. But the sincere yearning for a single, solitary,
religious centre has not waned, as the status of the Kotel (Western Wall) in the eyes of the general
population demonstrates. We can distinguish two main attitudes in the Masorti Movement concerning the contents of 'Kedushat ha-Yom'. One attitude regards praying for a Third Temple positively, but not for the restoration of the sacrificial system. According to this attitude, the yearning for a Third Temple symbolizes a yearning for the reunification of the Jewish people (including a reunion of emotions) and the realization of the values of universal peace and tolerance enshrined in the prophetic visions of the 'culmination of history' (Acharit ha-Yamim). The manner of worship in such a future Temple will be substantially different from what we have known thus far - just as worship by prayer ritual became the dominant form of worship after the sacrificial system had become impossible because of the destruction of the Bet Mikdash. We cannot know today, in advance, what new manner of worship will come about in the future. This attitude is based on the visions of the prophets and on the words of Rambam in his book Moreh Nevukhim (The Confused Man's Guide) - mainly chapter 32 of part three. The other main attitude in the Masorti Movement sees the sacrificial cultus as an historical stage in the spiritual development of the Jewish people - a stage that received God's blessing in the Torah through the multifarious details of its observance. Accordingly, we should not deny this stage in our history, but we should relate to it in the past tense and not as something desired for the future. This attitude was the dominant one in American Conservative Judaism since the third decade of the twentieth century, and many see it as a tradition that has been hallowed by time. Obviously, just as the two attitudes are not identical neither are they mutually contradictory. There will be worshippers who will find the one attitude more to their liking than the other and there will be others who will wish to adopt both attitudes simultaneously.
More relevant to Jim's original question, I think, is what should be our attitude to the sacrificial
system as practiced by our ancestors (a system which has now been defunct for almost 1932 years). I do
not think that any reasonable person would wish to deny that our ancestors saw in the ritual killing of
animals an act of worship. Even less would such a person wish to pretend that such worship was never
practiced, that the Temple ritual is a historical fiction. On the contrary: it is a historical fact. It
is perhaps almost impossible for us today to comprehend the enormous love - yes, love - which our
ancestors had for the Bet Mikdash and its ritual. In many places our classical sources offer detailed
accounts of the minutiae of the system, accounts in such detail that they remind us of the ardour of the
fan, the lover. This too is a very important historical fact. At the time of the publication of the
Mishnah, nearly 150 years after the cataclysmic end of the sacrificial cult, the sages were still
dwelling lovingly over these details and ardently prayed for its restoration. (To this day, the orthodox
prayer-book retains specific please to God to restore the sacrificial cult.) However, this historical perspective is only acceptable in our heads; in our hearts we have a deeper problem. While we can recognize that our ancestors loved and cherished the sacrificial cult, we are worried that the merciful Deity to whom we address our prayers and who is the object of our belief could condone and require the killing of animals for this purpose. (Jim and I would agree to change 'this' to 'almost any'.) Yesterday I touched briefly on the way in which Rambam deals with this issue in his Guide for the Perplexed. I shall now develop his response. Rambam claims that the sacrificial system was a historical necessity. People - including us today! - are influenced by behaviours which are generally practiced by honourable people. In the ancient world the almost universal form of worship practiced by honourable and worthy people - of all faiths and all nationalities - was the sacrifice of animals to the gods. Rambam claims that if God had denied Israel this form of worship it would have been a psychological disaster: people would have felt spiritually unsatisfied had they been denied worship by animal sacrifice, just as today people would feel spiritually unsatisfied if they were denied verbal prayer as their act of worship. Rambam says that in all matters involving the ritual killing of animals (for both food and worship) we must perceive a restrictive process at work through an imagined permission. With great brevity: you can no longer kill any animal you choose and eat it as you please. You can only kill certain animals for food, only in a certain way, and you can only consume them under certain restricting circumstances. Thus Rambam suggests (and 750 years later Rav Kuk enthusiastically agreed) that we should see in the rules and regulations of kashrut the first tentative stages of a process designed to wean Jews away from the consumption of dead animals and back to mankind's pristine vegetarianism (culminating in world-wide vegetarianism in the messianic age). Rambam applies the same thinking to animal sacrifice: the minutiae of the laws are really restrictive rather than permissive. Our study of the way in which the paschal lamb was slaughtered is historical: that is what was done and the Mishnah describes how it was done. Our study does not imply approval. Having said all this I hope it will now be clear why I do not accept that there is a connection between our study of an ancient and now defunct sacrificial cult and our modern observance of Shabbat. Much of what I have written above is adumbrated in a message received from Naomi Koltun-Fromm. Here is what she has written: I have been reading (rather slogging through) Jacob Milgrom's 3 vol Anchor Bible commentary to Leviticus. His theory or understanding of the Priestly notion of sacrifice and that of the dietary laws is that eating meat was a divine concession to human hunger for flesh. The first concession is with Noah - when humans are allowed for the first time to eat meat, but that they must pour the blood on to the ground. The dietary laws of Lev 11 (clean and unclean animals) is a means to restrict the kind of meat an Israelite can eat - thereby restricting the overall consumption of meat. The last layer of the Priestly texts (H in Milgrom's opinion) restricts all meat consumption to sacrificial meat - that is one cannot consume meat that has not had its blood dashed against the altar. The rationale for all this is the priestly belief that all life is sacred and taking the life of an animal is close to murder, and hence the blood - the animal's life force - must be 'returned' to God as an acknowledgement of the life taken. It is an interesting theory - and works well for those who wish to forgo meat on religious grounds. What doesn't work for me is the fact that the priests then end up with an over abundance of meat! I comment: 'It is an interesting theory' - which Milgrom seems to have cribbed directly from Rambam! I have received many messages in appreciation of my comments on the ethical problematica concerning the restoration of the sacrificial cult. They are far too many for me to be able to respond to each one personally, so please accept this as my thanks for your kind words. However, I have also received some messages that contain disagreement at one level or another, and I wish to conclude this series with what some of them have written. Ed Frankel supports the restoration of animal sacrifice: While I am not a vegetarian, I can understand Jim's views. At the same time, though, to me the most glorious aspect of our tradition is the idea that we are serving God. Frankly, I have no great desire to offer animal sacrifices ever, and yet if the Temple were rebuilt with animal sacrifice as part of our new worship, I am not sure that I would abstain from participating in the sacrificial cult. Mike Rodin while appreciative would like to see the method expanded: The discussion about the sacrificial cult and its relationship to modern Judaism, and modern Jews, was most instructive, and I thank you for it. The issue of 'coming to grips' with the fact that our religion is an ancient one with its historical and theological roots firmly planted in a ancient, and in some respects, more barbaric time is one with which many of us must struggle often. (I say in some respects more barbaric, we can certainly do much more damage to our fellow humans and the world now than the ancients could even imagine, except when thinking of what G-D could do). This issue of our roots and how the modern plant that has sprung from them should be cultivated, extends not only to the sacrificial cult, but the status of women, and dare I suggest, the brit milah. For me, the process of inquiry and considering these things is as important as the conclusions reached either by the current Conservative movement, or by each of us as individual Jews. I respond: I believe the Conservative Movement has gone a long way in the past three decades towards equality of the sexes. The door is open. many women have chosen to enter it. As for the rest, the decision is theirs. I wrote: Rambam suggests (and 750 years later Rav Kuk enthusiastically agreed) that we should see in the rules and regulations of kashrut the first tentative stages of a process designed to wean Jews away from the consumption of dead animals and back to mankind's pristine vegetarianism (culminating in world-wide vegetarianism in the messianic age). Yiftah Shapir demurs: Allow me to disagree on that particular issue of 'return to mankind's pristine vegetarianism'. It is a romantic belief which has little to do with reality as science sees it today. Recent scientific research shows that Neanderthals were almost totally carnivores. Unlike Neanderthals Homo Sapiens consumed more vegetarian food but have always been omnivores (like chimpanzees, bears and pigs) (some company we have...). Our digestive system is by no means the digestive system of totally vegetarian animals. I respond: I think you have misunderstood (probably because my syntax was wanting). Neither Rambam nor Rav Kuk were proposing a scientific conceptualization, but a halakhic-ethical one: In Genesis [1:29] man is authorized only a vegetarian diet. Rav Kuk adds that man will return to this state at the culmination of human history in the messianic age. The comments have a religious etiology, not a scientific one: mythos, not logos. Yiftah continues: Going from biology to ethics - I believe that on one hand humans have a moral obligation to get above their pristine drives - but on the other hand they should never try to escape their nature altogether. Take sexual behaviour for exapmle. Like all animals we have sexual drive. On one hand we are required to abstain from some types of sexual behaviour - copulating with our offsprings for example. But on the other hand we should not abstain from sex altogether. This attitude is of course the attitude of the Halakha all along the way, and in this particular issue of sexual behaviour it is diametrically opposed to the attitudes of christianity. I apply the same moral thinking to consumption of meat and the use of animal products. I don't see it as morally wrong. on the contrary - I see this longing for a 'pristine period' of vegetarianism as an attempt to escape our own nature rather than just restricting it. At any rate - the use of animal products is deeply ingrained in our religious customs. Even vegans read from Torah scrolls made of animal skin, put on tefillin every day - and in two weeks from today will put Zeroa and Beitza on their Seder plate. I respond: As to the last point: not so! Rav Huna in the Talmud [Pesaĥim 114b] gives vegetable alternatives for the shankbone and the egg! Most religious vegans try to buy tefillin made from animals that died naturally, rather than having been put to death. Yiftah's message also had a last paragraph which I omit because the idea expressed in it is also contained in this message from Derek Fields: I read your response on the sacrifices with great interest but ultimately found it unsatisfying. It is relatively easy for vegetarians and vegans to agree that 'that was then, and this is now' and that what might be interesting from the point of view of communal history need have no direct bearing on present day practice. However, for the vast majority of us who eat 'dead animals', the study of the sacrificial system has (or should have) more direct importance. As a meat eater, I am able to participate directly in Mitzvot that vegetarians do not. Without meat, most of the laws of kashrut become meaningless: there is no meat to separate from milk, there is no selection of clean and unclean animals, no need to worry about killing that animal as humanely as possible, no issue about draining blood or not eating certain cuts. I do not eat meat only in order to perform Mitzvot, but each time I do eat meat, I do so in the context of G-d's commandments on how I can eat a dead animal and still participate in G-d's covenant. I respond: If one accepts the thrust of modern biblical scholarship on the one hand and Jewish religious thinking from such stalwarts as Rambam on the other we see that in the Torah meat-eating was grudgingly granted to man and hedged around with precautionary mitzvot. The most humane treatment of animals is not to kill them at all, and if one respects their life by not consuming their flesh the lesson is just as meaningful - maybe more meaningful - as eating their flesh with certain halakhic proscriptions. However, we must be very careful to point out that from the strictly halakhic point of view carnivorous habits are not only condoned by the Torah, but assumed. Derek continues: I am baffled by other meat eaters who express revulsion about the sacrificial system. I think that it is not the loss of the sacrificial system, but the fact that killing animals is now done out of the sight of most of us that leads to this view. As you point out, hundreds of years later, Rabbis were enamored with the sacrifices, so the loss of the sacrificial system itself did not cause people to become squeamish about killing animals. It is with the industrialization of slaughterhouses, when we are able to get our meat nicely packaged with little tags that ensure us that all Kosher laws were observed, that people become uncomfortable with description of blood and gore. We no longer personally bloody our hands; we do not ourselves take a living creature and slit its throat, thereby taking its life; we do not drain the blood or salt the meat. We just go to our Kosher butcher or supermarket, pick up a package, cook it and eat it. The study of the sacrifices reminds those of us who eat meat of both the gravity and the permissibility of what we do. It reminds us that even now, when the slaughter is far removed from our daily experience, we have a moral obligation to acknowledge what has been done for our benefit and with our consent. For me, this is what studying the sacrifices means. This concludes our study of Chapter Five.
|
The executive of the Bet Mikdash would provide 'smooth small sticks' - i.e. poles on which the animal
could be suspended. These poles were rested horizontally on the shoulders of two people with the animal
suspended from it (by its hind legs). Thus it could be skinned.