2,711 pages of Talmud. A gem a day.

My gems from this daf were making challah on the Festival and Hillel permitting the bringing of a bottle of teruma wine to the priest – apparently it was always good manners! The other gem is the concept of “Mitoch.” In the Mishnah, Beit Hillel permits carrying a child, Lulav, or Sefer Torah into public space (whereas it would be prohibited on Shabbat) on the Festival because of the principle of “Mitoch.” “Mitoch” states that since a Melachah (a form of work that is forbidden on Shabbat, but only on Shabbat) is permitted by the Torah on the festival for the sake of food preparation (because we need the festival to be a happy day and happy days = good food), that Melachah is permitted even for matters unrelated to food preparation.

Beit Hillel, they say: Since carrying out was permitted for the requirements of food preparation, it was also permitted not for these requirements.

I guess I like the idea that it’s not only Passover when we ask Mah nishtana halayla hazeh? What makes this night different from all others? We want the festivals to be different, and in particular to be joyous. There need to be restrictions to make sure we don’t make the day like every other day, but those restrictions do not need to be as restrictive as on Shabbat:

“Neither carry forth a burden out of your houses on the Shabbat day” (Jeremiah 17:22), from which Beit Hillel inferred: On Shabbat, yes, carrying from one domain to another is indeed prohibited; on a Festival, no, it is permitted.

So, carry your toddler, bring a bottle of wine to the priest, don’t worry about carrying your lulav in public, or dancing with the Torah in the public square. Make it joyful! Make it meaningful. Make is special, not just by what you don’t do, but more importantly, by what you DO do.

When we change our mind . . .

Today’s daf discusses things that are permitted on a holiday that are “undesirable” (meaning not ideal) but allowed because of the greater good of making the festival an oneg, a joy.

And Ulla said: With regard to three matters, the Sages permitted an action whose result is undesirable in order to encourage a desirable initial action. And these are the three matters: 1) spreading out the hide of an animal slaughtered on a Festival before those who will tread on it, And 2) replacing shutters of shops, 3) And the replacement of a bandage in the Temple.

We don’t want people to tan hides on the festival, but we want them to enjoy meat (it makes the day special as meat is not consumed so frequently) and perhaps someone would not slaughter an animal if they could not tan the hide and that would go to waste – so they permit the spreading of the skin to tan the hide so people won’t refrain from slaughtering the animal.

We don’t want vendors working in their shops, but there are lots of people who likely will need items for the festival on the day itself – so they allow them to open the shutters and their stores so people can get what they need and settle their tabs AFTER the holiday.

Lest you think that only “regular” people might play down the festival because of their own inconvenience, we see too that even a priest might not want to participate in his priestly duties on a festival – hence the bandage ruling. It is not usually permitted to change a bandage on a festival. But here, the Gemara allows it so that, if a priest has an injury that is wrapped, if he performs the festival service.sacrifice which requires him to remove that wrapping (since he cannot have a barrier on his hands when he performs these rights) the sages allow him to wrap back up afterword so he won’t be discouraged from doing his job.

The gem: Even in the ancient world, the rabbis were actively thinking about how to make celebrating the festival more practical in order to encourage the highest number of people to come and fully enjoy the holiday.

How do we do this today? What are the things that get int he way of people fully celebrating the holidays? How can we make it easier for them?

Got to be honest. I am not super excited about today’s daf which is all about designating doves for slaughtering and eating on the festival to make the day a delight. Now, normally we can’t move things that are not designated ahead of the holiday for a purpose (they are called mukzeh if they are forbidden to be moved). Our daf worries about if you designated a dove for slaughter – how do you know it’s the same dove when you return the next day?

MISHNA: Beit Shammai say: One may not take fledgling doves from a dovecote on a Festival, unless he shook the ones he wished to take while it was still day, thereby preparing them. And Beit Hillel say: It is not necessary to shake; rather, it is sufficient if one stands the day before and says: I will take this fledgling and that one.

I don’t know what they mean by shake, but clearly it will mark the dove in some way. The Gemara continues by imagining that perhaps the doves are different colors or weights . . .

My gem is simply that reading this has put the song “When Dove’s Cry” by Prince in my head all day.

Appearances are important.

No, I am not talking about how you dress – but about how you model what it means to be a Jew in the world.

We have had this lesson before, and now we have it again on today’s daf. The worry is doing something that is permitted but might appear to others as if we are doing something which would not be permitted and give them the wrong idea.

On today’s daf, it has to do with moving a ladder from one window of a dovecote to another. It’s permitted, but, if you were to walk around with that ladder, people might think you’re on your way to repair your roof – and that is NOT permitted on the festival.

A new piece on today’s daf is the question of if you can do these permitted/but not looking good actions in private where no one will see you . . .

However, in the private domain, where one will not be observed by strangers, everyone agrees that it is permitted.

The Gemara asks: Is that so? But didn’t Rav Yehuda say that Rav said: Wherever the Sages prohibited an action due to the appearance of prohibition, even if one performs the act in his innermost chamber, where no one will see it, it is prohibited.

So, we get to conflicting values. We get the strictness for the value of being a good role model in our actions where we do not want to do anything that will be mistaken for prohibited behavior. And we get eh value of living with integrity – where we are the exact same person in public as in private.

It does make me think about all the privacy issues with the internet. There are certainly things we say, think, do, look-up in private that don’t necessarily represent who we are or the image we want to project on the world.

The daf leaves us wondering: Should we have to defend things we do in private that really hurt no one? Where is the line of privacy? How do I continue to live with integrity?

“No person among you shall partake of blood, nor shall the stranger who resides among you partake of blood. And if any Israelite or any stranger who resides among them hunts down an animal or a bird that may be eaten, he shall pour out its blood and cover it with earth.” – Leviticus 17:12-13

There are lots of limitations on eating meat. The Torah never wants us to forget the preciousness of life. When we do eat meat, we need to honor the life taken through the method of slaughter, blessings, and, as we see in the above passage, when slaughtering a non-domesticated animal, covering the blood – the source of life.

Our daf deals with the question of if someone can dig up earth to cover the blood of an undomesticated animal (or one of questionable status) on festival days. It also asks if asks from a stove can be used to cover the blood? What about dirt prepared in advance to cover up fecal matter?

While this is not something we need to worry about in our day to day lives anymore (thank you butchers and thank you toilets) – I do wonder about how we can bring that confrontation with the blood of an animal into practice today. How do we honor the life given for our benefit? How do we remove all those layers that distance us from the taking of the life to confront that reality? How do we remain uncalloused to the spilling of blood (of an animal)?

Why did the chicken cross the road? To get fertilized by the rooster.

On today’s daf, we don’t get the most profound of lessons, but we get a good laugh.

The Sages taught in a baraita: Any species whose intercourse occurs only in the hours of the day is born only by day; any species whose intercourse occurs only at night is born only by night; any species whose intercourse occurs either by day or by night is born either by day or by night. The Gemara elaborates: Any species whose intercourse occurs by day is born by day, this is referring to a chicken.

Well, if sex in the Talmud was not entertaining enough – the Talmud realizing it’s own inaccuracy is amusing.

Is that so? But didn’t Rabbi Yosei ben Shaul say that Rav said: If one examined a chicken’s nest on a Festival eve and did not find an egg in it, and the following day he rose early and found an egg in it, it is prohibited? This indicates that a chicken might indeed lay an egg at night!

How do the rabbis solve this contradiction? The Gemara answers: There it is referring to an egg that the chicken absorbed from the earth, i.e., an unfertilized egg (that is not produced by intercourse) can be laid at night as well.

The Gemara challenges this: If so, in Rav Mari’s case too, you can say that the chicken absorbed from the earth and laid the egg during the night of the Festival. How, then, could Rav Mari permit the egg? The Gemara answers: There it is referring to a case where there is a male with it. The Gemara asks: Even where there is a male with it, one can also say that it absorbed from the earth rather than from the male. The Gemara answers that Ravina said: It is learned as a tradition that anywhere that a male is present, a chicken does not absorb from the earth.

Now I want you to play “Ain’t No Mountain High Enough” as you read the explanation of how close a rooster needs to be for us to assume all the eggs are fertilized.

The Gemara asks: Until where exactly is it considered to have a male with it; How near must a rooster be for this principle to come into effect? Rav Gamda said in the name of Rav: The male must be any place where the hen can hear its voice by day. If the chicken is close enough to hear the rooster’s call by day, the rooster is considered close enough to the chicken that the latter will produce eggs only through fertilization by the male. . .

The Gemara comments: And if there is a river between the rooster and the chicken, the chicken does not cross the river; but if there is a bridge, it crosses the river. And if there is only a rope bridge suspended across the river, the chicken will not cross on the rope. The Gemara comments: Nevertheless, an incident occurred in which a chicken crossed over on a rope bridge. However, one may not rely on this possibility.

I am picturing that chicken walking the rope bridge singing, “Ain’t no mountain high enough, ain’t no valley low enough, ain’t no river wide enough, to keep me from you!”

Hope this brought you a smile on New Year’s Day. L’Shana Tova.

A wonderful elderly woman died Friday night. We do not bury on Shabbat. The cemetery was booked solid for Sunday, Monday (today) is Labor Day and Erev Rosh haShana, Tuesday is first day Rosh haShana and Wednesday is second day. So, this woman is being buried Thursday, a full 6 days later.

This just happens sometimes. We are lucky we live in a time of refrigeration – the rabbis of the Talmud did not have that luxury. So, they made it easier to bury on Yom Tov:

Rava said: If one died on the first day of a Festival, gentiles should attend to his burial. If he died on the second day of a Festival, Jews should attend to his burial. And even with regard to the two Festival days of Rosh HaShana, the halakha is that the legal status of the two days is like that of the two days of the Festivals – meaning you bury even on second day Rosh haShana. ..Rav Ashi said: Even though the burial was not delayed, but it is the day that he died, we still do not delay the burial. What is the reason for this? With regard to the dead, the Sages equated the legal status of the second Festival day with that of a weekday.

Kavod haMet, honoring the dead, is such an important mitzvah in Judaism. In a time when the body would begin to decompose that day, when it would begin to smell and those left to guard it (an honor in Jewish tradition) would be repulsed by it – burying within 24 hours was the best way to honor the dead.

Today, with refrigeration, we have the ability to keep bodies longer so that more family will be able to travel into town, more friends take off work for those hours. This too is Kavod haMet, ensuring family and friends can be there. And so, for women like the one who passed on Shabbat, sometimes waiting 6 days is a way of providing more honor, not less.

Why do we observe two days of Rosh haShana today when we know for sure when the new month is? . . . that is actually a questions on today’s daf! One that we still ask today. We get another enduring questions as well – why do we still have to learn and study these rules that no longer apply to our world? We get this (partial) explanation:

The reason is that they explicitly voted to annul the decree, which indicates that if they had not voted, the ordinance would not have lapsed on its own, despite the fact that its justification was no longer applicable.

Rules are still in place, even if they no longer apply, and they should evolve with our evolution of what is justice, what does God want, and what is good. (As the Talmud says) What is the reason? May the Temple speedily be built!

We never know when things might change and these laws that are “on the books” but not applicable to life, may be enacted again.

3 State examples: 1) In 1931, West Virginia passed a law banning “lewd and lascivious cohabitation and conduct before marriage.” (The law was finally repealed in 2010.) 2) In Tennessee, it’s illegal to hold public office if a person does any of the following: “fight a duel, or knowingly be the bearer of a challenge to fight a duel, or send or accept a challenge for that purpose, or be an aider or abettor in fighting a duel.” DO you think this applies to those running for office who practice fencing? I doubt it, but we should change that law just in case . . . and 3) my favorite. Apparently, it’s illegal to eat fried chicken with a fork and knife in Georgia. Apparently, in 2009, a woman was arrested as a practical joke for violating the law, but was later pardoned. 

The lesson? Change the laws on the books to fit our current sense of justice.

Ever regret something you said or did while drunk? Well, imagine if you were a posek (a giver of law)! Today’s gem is Rav Pappa’s realization that he is too drunk to make a halakhic ruling . . .

Rav Pappa’s host, and some say it was a certain man who came before Rav Pappa, had these eggs that were laid on a Shabbat that occurred before a Festival. He came before him and said to him: What is the halakha with regard to whether it is permitted to eat these eggs tomorrow, on the Festival? Rav Pappa said to him: Go away from me now, and come back tomorrow. He said this because Rav would not place a disseminator before him to explain his lectures, from one Festival day until the end of the other, the second Festival day, due to drunkenness. Since it was customary in those times to drink a great deal of wine during Festival meals, Rav was concerned that his mind would not be sufficiently clear to issue a public ruling.

When that man came back on the following day, Rav Pappa said to him: Had I issued a ruling for you then, I would have forgotten the correct response. . .

What a gem! It’s a festival and so Rav Pappa has been drinking wine, enough so that he knows that he should not be issuing laws. (It’s the rabbinic version of knowing you shouldn’t drive home.) I appreciate him having the humility to admit he was not in a good headspace and waiting till the next day to sober up.

A good lesson for anyone celebrating – when you’re drunk is NOT the time to make big decisions.

Today’s gem is a Talmudic nod to how we can have a thousand things go right – but how we fixate on the one thing that went wrong. Continuing our discussion of what to do with an egg that was laid on a festival we read:

And even if there is uncertainty with regard to whether this egg was laid on a Festival, it is prohibited to move it. And, furthermore, if it became intermingled with a thousand permitted eggs, they are all prohibited.

So, we see that we cannot move that egg that day and if the prohibited egg is somehow in a lot of a thousand permitted eggs, they are ALL prohibited on that day.

It truly makes me think about life – about how we have so so many blessings, thousands, that we experience every day – and yet it’s that one thing, that one insecurity, that overshadows all that good, that prevents us from noting all that good.

Our daily prayers try and help us do the opposite by making us notice specific and various little miracles in our lives, like successfully emptying your bowels, being able to get the sleep from your eyes, hearing the roosters crow (or at my house the ducks squawk). . . may you not fixate on the one thing in a thousand – but enjoy the thousands of blessings you receive every day.