Avot296

1:
At first glance our mishnah seems very strange. We ask ourselves what can be the significance of something being created "on Erev Shabbat at twilight"? We ask ourselves what some of the rather strange items mentioned can possibly be. Let us say at this stage that our present mishnah has enormous theological importance, and we shall, God willing, begin to explore the seeming problematica of our mishnah in the next shiur.

To be continued.

Tamar Dar has written to ask three questions. Her first question is about the phrase in the Mishnah [Avot 293]: People stood crowded but had enough room to prostrate themselves. Tamar writes: It is not clear to me what this phrase means.

I respond:

A full explanation of this phrase was given in Avot 295. (Tamar wrote before we had reached that part of the mishnah.)

In Avot 293 I wrote: It would be almost impossible to find in them [the Omer sheaf] a disqualifying defect. Tamar objects:

You do not take into account the possible presence of various insects that might disqualify the grain from the moment is was brought by road or was stored in barns. And, of course, the grain might go sour.

I respond:

The reaping of the Omer is described in detail in Mishnah Menaĥot 10:3. The Omer sheaf was ceremonially reaped, by torchlight, by the High Priest during the evening following the first day of Passover. Together with a large crowd he would go into a carefully prepared field next to the Temple compound. There he would be directed to a sheaf that had already been carefully selected. He would be handed a special ceremonial sickle. He would ask the assembled crowd "Has the sun set?" Then he would ask "Shall I reap with this sickle?" Then he would ask "Shall I put it into this holder?" And finally he asked "Shall I reap now?" Each question was ceremonially asked three times and each time the crowd responded in the affirmative. Only then did the High Priest cut the sheaf of the Omer. This sheaf was taken immediately by torchlight to the priestly courtyard where it was singed and then watched all night by priests on duty and offered on the altar the following day. Such a ceremonial, and the singe, hardly leaves any room for an unexpected disqualification.

Tamar also writes: If we are told that no woman ever miscarried because of the stench of the disqualified meat women must have visited the Bet Mikdash. It is possible that such things happened, otherwise why suddenly bring the matter up?

I respond:

I must correct Tamar here. No mention was made in the mishnah of 'disqualified meat'; the mishnah refers to the meat from the animals that were slaughtered and then burned on the altar. I must agree with Tamar's reasoning about this topic being mentioned in our mishnah: it does sound rather spurious – or what I called in our last shiur "a pious terminological inexactitude".

Due to the incidence of Rosh ha-Shanah the next shiur in this series will be, God willing, on Tuesday 18th September. I take this opportunity to wish everybody a very happy New Year. May this coming year be a year of peace, development and spiritual growth; a year during which, by improving the spiritual quality of the way we lead our lives, we shall hasten the golden age to come when "the earth will be filled with the knowledge of God as the waters cover the sea" [Isaiah 11:9]. May we all be inscribed for a good year. Amen.