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

Abaye arranged the sequence of the daily services in the Temple based on tradition and in accordance with the opinion of Abba Shaul:

And so our daf today proceeds to discuss the order of things, from donning tefillin, to setting up logs, to cleaning ashes.

Order matters. When my oldest son was little I learned this well, if we did the night time routine out of order – he couldn’t sleep. So too we need order in our lives. Order helps us to feel safe, to not miss steps and to elevate the mundane into the holy.

Right now feels chaotic. Here is to praying for more holiness, peace, and order.

I was (and am) a huge Madonna fan growing up. I remember watching her Blond Ambition tour on VHS over and over. One of the coolest things she did, that is now copied by so many artists, was her costume change. Mid-concert, she would suddenly appear in a different outfit! Well, I thought she was the O.G. costume changer – but it turns out the High Priest was:

And they are five services: The sacrifice of the daily morning offering, performed in golden garments; the service of the day, the sacrifice of the bull and the goat, which is performed in white garments; the sacrifice of his ram guilt-offering and the ram of the people in golden garments. After that he removes the spoon and the coal pan from the Holy of Holies in white garments.He emerges from the Holy of Holies and sacrifices the daily afternoon offering in golden garments.

That’s right, 5 costume changes! That’s impressive.

But a bigger lesson we can learn from this is about how the proper outer attire can help us to feel the proper inner spirituality.

Many Jews buy new clothes for the High Holy Days, and while this may sound materialistic, it doesn’t have to be – it can be really spiritual if we are dressing for God and wanting to look good as we stand in judgement before God instead of dressing to impress our neighbors in the pews.

There is also a tradition to wear white at the end of Yom Kippur. The white we don on the outside is there to reflect our souls which have been cleansed by the t’shuvah work we have done.

The costume change is not just a costume change, but a reflection of the changes we have spiritually undergone. (While could be compared to Madonna’s costume change when she goes into her kabbalistic work . . . but that might be stretching it.)

We can be sure, but still leave space that we might (however unlikely) be wrong. That’s my gem from today’s page that comes right from Rav Papa (and yes, his name sounds like a 90s rapper):

The Sages said to Rav Pappa: And how can you say that according to Rabbi Meir the first time that the High Priest dons the garments he does not require two sanctifications? Wasn’t it taught in a baraita as follows? They spread a sheet of fine linen between him and the people, and he removed his garments and descended and immersed, and he ascended and dried himself. They brought him golden garments, and he donned them, and he sanctified his hands and his feet. Rabbi Meir says: He removed his garments and sanctified his hands and his feet and descended and immersed. He ascended and dried himself. They brought him golden garments and he donned them and sanctified his hands and his feet. Apparently, Rabbi Meir maintains that there is a special sanctification prior to donning the garments.

And here’s the line I love: He said to them: If it was taught, it was taught.

Rav Papa is saying, “I will retract my opinion, which was based on logical analysis, in favor of an explicit baraita that contradicts that opinion.” I reasoned really well, but if I’m wrong, I’m wrong.

How can we live life in this space? Holding opinions that are backed up by knowledge, but ready to let them go if faced with facts that point otherwise? Wouldn’t our world be so much better if we were all strong in our beliefs but open to being wrong and changing our ways like Rav Papa?

Being from Indiana, if people went “away” to college, it was usually either to Indiana University or Purdue (both great school by the way). I remember hearing this joke as a child: Two college boys walk into the mens room and use the urinal. The student from Purdue heads towards the door while the student from IU heads to the sink to wash his hands. “At IU they teach us to wash our hands after we urinate,” says the IU student. The Purdue student responds, “At Purdue they teach us not to pee on our hands.”

Today’s daf is much grosser than that joke. It is all about the need to wash you hands after you urinate because you need to use your hands to wipe pee off your legs (this sees to be a common occurrence) – lest people believe you have a severed penis and someone else fathered your children.

Then, it gets even more gross with the potty talk as it goes into excrement being stuck to your anus.

The gem? Wash your hands, even if you don’t think you have anything on them.

Now, if this kind of thing turns your stomach – stop reading. If it doesn’t, enjoy the text:

Granted, one who urinates is required to sanctify his feet, due to drops of urine that drip on his feet. However, with regard to his hands, what is the reason that he is required to sanctify them? His hands did not come into contact with anything filthy (It’s the student form Purdue!!!). Rabbi Abba said: That is to say that one learns appropriate conduct from this, namely it is a mitzva to brush the drops of urine from one’s legs so that they cannot be seen. Since one rubs it with his hands, his hands require sanctification as well. The Gemara comments: This supports the opinion of Rabbi Ami, as Rabbi Ami said: It is prohibited for a man to go out with the drops of urine that are on his legs, because he appears as one whose penis has been severed. A man with that condition is incapable of fathering children. People who see urine on his legs might suspect that he is suffering from that condition and spread rumors about his children that they are mamzerim. Therefore, one must be certain to brush the drops of urine from his legs.

Apropos the above discussion the Gemara cites that Rav Pappa said: For one with excrement in its place, in the anus, it is prohibited to recite Shema until he removes it. What are the circumstances? If it is excrement that is visible, it is obvious that he cannot recite Shema, as there is excrement on his skin. If it is excrement that is not visible, and it is inside his body, how can Rav Pappa rule that he may not recite Shema? The Torah was not given to the ministering angels, and one’s body cannot be totally free of excrement. The Gemara answers: No, it is necessary to prohibit the recitation of Shema only in a situation where when he is sitting it is visible, and when he is standing it is not visible.

The Gemara asks: If so, in what way is that different from excrement on his flesh? As it was stated in a case where one has excrement on his flesh or that his hands were placed into a bathroom that Rav Huna said: It is nevertheless permitted to recite Shema. And Rav Ḥisda said: It is prohibited to recite Shema in those cases. The Gemara rejects this: The situations are not comparable. There is no dispute that excrement in its place is more severe, as in the anus the filth is great because it is new and malodorous. And if it is not in its place, its filth is not great, as it is dried and less malodorous. It is with regard to that situation that there is an amoraic dispute.

The Gemara proceeds to discuss a related topic. The Sages taught a halakha with regard to a meal in a baraita: A person who exits a meal to urinate washes one of his hands, the one that he used to brush off drops of urine, and enters to resume the meal. If one left, spoke with another, and lingered outside, he washes both of his hands and enters to resume the meal. Presumably, during the lengthy conversation he was distracted from maintaining the cleanliness of his hands, requiring him to wash his hands again. And when one washes his hands for the meal he should not wash them outside and then enter, due to the concern that doing so will arouse suspicion that he did not wash his hands. Rather, he enters and sits in his place and washes both his hands, and returns the jug of water to pass among the guests and ask if anyone requires water, to make certain that everyone is aware that he washed his hands.

Rav Ḥisda said: We said this principle with regard to making certain that one washes his hands in public only when he enters to drink; however, if he enters and intends to eat he may even wash his hands outside and enter. Why is this so? It is because it is well known that he is fastidious and would not handle food without cleaning urine and the like off his hands. Rav Naḥman bar Yitzḥak said: And I can even wash my hands outside when I intend only to drink, because they know that I am fastidious and that I certainly washed my hands before I entered to eat.

More gems kick off the page:

Thoughts of transgression are worse than transgression itself, and your mnemonic is the odor of meat. The smell of roasting meat is more appetizing than actually eating the meat. How true! The fantasy is so often better than the reality. In fantasy world, there are no bills, no distractions, no “life getting in the way” . . . I love the idea of it smelling better than it tastes.

The heat of the end of summer is more oppressive than the heat of the summer itself, and your mnemonic is a heated oven. After an oven has been heated several times in the course of a day, lighting it again, even slightly, will produce powerful heat. So too, at the end of the summer, since everything is hot, the heat is more oppressive. Also very true! (This happens in my toaster all the time. . . and in Miami.)

A fever in the winter is more powerful than a fever in the summer, and your mnemonic is a cold oven. Heating a cold oven requires greater heat than heating a hot oven. A fever that succeeds in raising the body temperature in the winter must be more powerful than a fever that raises the body temperature in the summer. (This is interesting because, now, do to Covid, we take temperatures all the time, but it turns out our natural temp. is not universal and is most likely lower than 98 degrees.)

Relearning old material that was known and forgotten is more difficult than learning from new material. And your mnemonic is mixing mortar from mortar. It is harder to take hardened mortar, crush it, and mix new mortar than it is to simply mix new mortar. I love this as someone who is always trying to learn – it does get harder. It’s not impossible, but wow is it a struggle. But, hopefully, if we keep trying to learn our whole lives, our brains will remain more pliable than the mortar metaphor.

MISHNA:The appointed priest said to the other priests: Go out and observe if it is day and the time for slaughter has arrived. If the time has arrived, the observer says: There is light [barkai]. Matya ben Shmuel says that the appointed priest phrased his question differently: Is the entire eastern sky illuminated even to Hebron? And the observer says: Yes. And why did they need to ascertain whether or not it is day, which is typically evident to all? It was necessary, as once, the light of the moon rose, and they imagined that the eastern sky was illuminated with sunlight, and they slaughtered the daily offering. . .

First, how romantic – a moon so full that you think it’s day light.

But that’s not what today’s daf is about, it’s about how to tell if it’s really day (with some fun asides). We also get a little science. We are told Abraham was a master at astronomy, and we are also told something a lot fo Floridians know: that you can get a LOT of sun on cloudy day.

The Gemara asks: And are sunlight and moonlight mistaken for one another? Wasn’t it taught in a baraita that Rabbi Yehuda HaNasi says: A column of the light of the moon is not similar to a column of the light of the sun; a column of the light of the moon rises like a staff in one column while a column of the light of the sun diffuses to here and to there? The Gemara answers that the school of Rabbi Yishmael taught: It was a cloudy day, and then even the moonlight diffuses to here and to there, which caused them to err and believe that it was the rising sun. Rav Pappa said: Learn from this statement of Rabbi Yishmael that a cloudy day is similar to a completely sunny day because the sunlight is further diffused by the clouds. . .

Apropos a cloudy day, the Gemara cites that Rav Naḥman said: The hazy light of the sun through the clouds is more damaging than the light of the sun itself.

And now we get some gems (besides the gem that we should wear sunblock on cloudy days) in the ways the rabbis say we should remember this rule:

And your mnemonic is the cover of a jar of vinegar: What do they mean? Well, as anyone who uses vinegar knows, “as long as the jar is tightly closed, the odor of the vinegar does not spread and it intensifies. Even the slightest opening in the lid releases an odor more powerful than the odor generated by vinegar that was not sealed in a jar.” (It’s like a punch in the face.) The same is true with regard to the rays of the sun. With regard to sunlight that is obscured behind clouds, when it escapes through breaks in the clouds it is more powerful than direct sunlight. We also are told that Dazzling sunlight, which shines through cracks in the clouds, is more harmful to the eyes than direct sunlight. And your mnemonic is a drip; water that drips on a person is more bothersome than water in which one completely immerses his body.

Love these. Hope you do too.

Rabbi Asi said that Rabbi Yoḥanan said: A non-priest who set up the arrangement of wood on the altar is liable to receive the death penalty by God’s hand for having performed an act that is restricted to priests, and the woodpile that he placed is invalid.

Today’s daf focuses in on what services can be done by non-priests, and which, if done by a non-priest, will cause the offending non-priest to die.

I can’t stop thinking how this would make an amazing plot for a book or short story. So, indulge me and picture it: The pressure to have a son, but not just any son, a perfect son without defect so that he can serve in the Temple, was weighing on Rebecca. He sister had a child with birth defects, and was therefore unable to work in the Temple. But what is to be expected after generations of only marrying within the family? Most marriages being between cousins. Rebecca’s father is a Kohein, and therefore, she and her sister were expected to marry Kohein’s as well. And so she did. Rebecca has been married now for over a year, and still no child. Oh she wants a child! Someone to love, to care for, to sew priestly linen garments for . . . but Rebecca sees her sisters’ child, and how her sister loves him, yet her husband and father burn with shame . . . and she wonders if her barrenness is better than that – the possibility of having a child who is deemed unacceptable for the service he was created to perform.

But she would do it, risk it for a child to call her own. But years of inbreeding may have left her “perfect” husband steril. What is she to do?

What comes next can hardly be called an affair. It was more of a mothers choice to give her child the best chance at life and health. A boarder passing through town. One night, one moment really, never to be spoked about, or thought about, again. The joy on her husbands face as her belly grew. The joy on her fathers face when she delivered a son – a perfect baby boy – who would go to serve it the Temple.

Her joy at watching him grow would fill countless books, but it seemed like the blink of an eye, and he was old enough to serve in the Temple. She sewed for him beautiful linen garments. He began to serve in the Temple with his cousins – the other Kohenim. His father was so proud.

And then the day came when he was old enough to enter the lotteries – he threw his name and hopes into being selected to offer the sacrifices.

Rebecca knew. She was a daughter and wife of a kohein after all. She knew that if her son was selected to perform any of the slaughtering, any of the sprinkling, any of the collecting – that he would be killed by the hands of God. But what was she to say?

Honey, why not just see if you can have the honor of arranging the wood? Nothing can happen without the wood – it may be the most important of all the functions a priest can do. (Maybe then he will be safe.)

Will he listen? Will he be safe? Will he put his name into the lottery? Each day, she waits, terrified. Until . . .

Her husband comes home one night and tells her – there has been a terrible accident. Their son, her son, was arranging the wood and his britches caught fire. He suffered. Called out for his mom. Called out to his God. But his suffering has now ended . . .

He listened to his mother. He did everything right. He was perfect. And now, he’s gone.

Today’s daf deals primarily with how many priests are required for each sacrificial service in the temple and what the individuals assigned to a task do. The real gem of the page is an open conversation about work load and how many employees are required for a congregation (or ay business) to really do the work of their mission. How do we make sure our employees are doing meaningful work but not being burnt out?

But what I will paste is a funny/shocking aside that Rav Ashi brings as proof that the water libation is brought only in the morning service:

Rav Ashi said: We too have learned this in a different mishna, that the water libation was offered only in the morning, as it was taught: And they would say to the pourer: Raise your hand so everyone will see as you pour the water into the aperture on the altar, in accordance with the proper procedure. This was done because one time a Sadducee priest, who did not accept that there is a mitzva of water libation, poured the water onto his feet, whereupon all the people pelted him with their etrogim in anger. Since the episode involved etrogim, it is apparent that it took place in the morning, when people have their etrogim with them. Since the mishna mentions the fact that it was etrogim that were used to pelt the priest, it is apparently coming to teach that the water libation takes place only in the morning.

Hope you have a meaningful last day of the work week and get rest and renewal on Shabbat.

Playing the lottery can make you rich . . .

We’ve been discussing the various lotteries the priests had in order to determine who would perform what service. Today we learn that these services required many priests, and that, who ever “won” the lottery for that particular service, would take the priests around them to perform the service (a bit of a debate ensues about if its 12 or 13 priests . . .). And then we get a strange line:

It might have entered your mind to say that since the burning of incense is infrequent and it brings about wealth we should institute a separate lottery . . .

If bringing incense made you wealthy stoners, wiccans, and tarot card readers would be running the world. But seriously, what is happening here?

The rabbis are debating if the honor of burning incense demands it’s own lottery since it’s seen as this good-luck charm that brings about wealth. Bu apparently, it’s not just the incense that makes you wealthy . . .

The Tanna of this Beraita believes that the coal pan, like the incense, also makes a Priest wealthy, as we see on tomorrow’s daf (26). Rav Pappa said to Abaye: What is the reason for this assertion that the one who burns the incense becomes wealthy? If we say it is because it is written: “They shall put incense before You and whole burnt-offerings on Your altar” (Deuteronomy 33:10), and it is written immediately after that: “Bless, O Lord, his substance” which teach that the coal pan makes one wealthy! This is why the Priest who would perform the coal pan was selected only by the third lottery.

So, we may be wondering, if these make you rich – is it really fair that everyone has an equal go at it? Shouldn’t we select the poorest priests to help pull them out of poverty? The Sages agree. Only Priests who had never been selected to perform the sacrifice of the incense or coal pan were permitted to participate in that lottery.

I don’t think things like pulling people out of poverty should be left to games of chance. Too often today, the only hope many believe they have for getting out of poverty is “playing the numbers.” Shame on us – richest country in the world and allowing so many to be homeless and food insecure. On our daf, we have a bit of a value lesson – if there is a proven opportunity to pull someone out of poverty – then let those who need it be the ones to take on that opportunity, not, as is often the case, have it be just another chance for the rich to get richer . . .

One of the Sages asked: Why did the Temple authorities hold lotteries? The Gemara asks, What do you mean: Why did they hold lotteries? The reason is as we said clearly in the mishna: To prevent quarrels among the priests. The Gemara explains: Rather, this is the meaning of the question: Why did they hold a lottery in the way that they held the lottery by and once again gathering them together to hold another lottery? Meaning that they would hold 4 separate lotteries throughout the day instead of just having all 4 at the same time when they were all together.

Rabbi Yoḥanan said: It was done this way in order to create a commotion throughout the Temple courtyard, as the priests would converge from all over to assemble there – this would be a great honor for God and the Temple service, as it is stated: “We took sweet counsel together, in the House of God we walked with the throng” (Psalms 55:15).

This is the building up of anticipation! It keeps everyone on their toes. I think about fundraisers that announce winners sporadically throughout the night. Everyone wants to stay till the next announcement to see if they’ve won. This is similar.

Then it goes on to ask if the priests wear their priestly garments when they hold the lottery, and here is my gem:

Rav Naḥman said: The priests were dressed in non-sacred garments, because if you say the lottery was to be held when they were dressed in their sacred garments, there are strong-armed men who might act with force and perform the service even if they did not win the lottery.

Wow, there are bullies and strong men even in the priesthood. We are already holding the lottery to try and stop the priests from fighting, but here we get another layer – that if those bully-priests are already in their priestly garments, and some pipsqueak wins the lottery, he will just push the weaker priest aside and go perform the rite before the winner has the opportunity.

The Gemara is trying to set up rules to protect the little guy. And that is what so much of law should, and is, about: how to protect he weak, how to make sure that everyone truly has a fighting chance in life.