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

Today’s is Yom Kippur, so what better than an entire daf that discusses what the Kohanim (Priests) wear! We learn that if the Priest is not dressed appropriately, the offerings do not count. The robe can’t be too short or too long and you have to make sure it tis the appropriate length when it’s belted.

As I put on my robe to lead the Yom Kippur service, I love the focus on fashion. It is the LEAST important thing, and yet, if you’re wearing something distracting, it’s the only thing the congregation will remember and talk about.

A meaningful fast for you all.

It’s yom Kippur tonight! Our time to do the work of teshuvah before judgement is closing. So, a good gem for us:

Rabba said: Why do I need that which the Merciful One wrote, i.e., that an impure priest, and one who immersed that day, and one who has not yet brought an atonement offering all disqualify the rites they perform?

The question points to a difference between a person who has sinned and apologized (compare to one who immersed) and a person who is showing their contrition through action (one who brings a sacrifice). It’s not enough to just say things, we can’t just talk the talk – we need to walk the walk as well!

May we all do better in the year to come.

There is a joke that there are prayer aerobics, because we ask the congregation to stand up and sit down so many times, you get your squats in. But why do we have to stand for certain prayers while for others we sit? At first glance, our daf seems very disconnected from our lives today, until we remember that with the destruction of the second Temple and the birth of Rabbinic Judaism, the sacrificial rites were replaced by prayer. Our daf talks to us about when we can sit, and when we must stand in sacrifice:

A priest who was sitting may partake of the meat of offerings, if he performed sacrificial rites he has desecrated the service. . .

When it’s about awe, about standing before God, we stand; when it’s about sustenance, about meat, we can sit. Awe: rise. Love: sit. Amidah: stand. Ahavat Olam: sit.

Get those squats in.

When I was 15 I went to Israel for the first time on a 6 week program with other teens. For one week of the program, we got to choose where we wanted to volunteer, I chose the army with a program called Gadna. While I was there, I was put on kitchen detail where I was chopping carrots. One of the cooks said I was going too slow and showed me how fast he wanted me to chop. That leads me to our daf today.

This is as Rabbi Yirmeya asked Rabbi Zeira: If the priest was sprinkling the blood, and the hand of the one sprinkling was severed before the blood reached the airspace of the altar, what is the halakha? And Rabbi Zeira said to him: It is not valid.

As Maimonides puts it, “If [a priest] was sprinkling [the blood of a sacrifice on the altar] and his hand was cut off before the blood reached the space above the altar, the sprinkling of the blood is not acceptable.”

Back to the army, the cook was chopping those carrots and . . . cut off the top of his finger.

I did not speed up my chopping.

Just a reminder that these holy priests were also butchers working with knives, and that it wasn’t always so safe for them.

We joke about having to go to school musicals where your kid is playing the third tree from the left. Well, today, on our daf describes a non-priest in the Temple as: a case where the non-priests served as a bench [itztaba].

Our daf is discussing the location of the slaughter of sacrifices (including incense, which I would not use the word “slaughter” to describe”), our intention, how we carry it (do we walk carrying it or pass it from one person to another), and the roll of the non-priest.

Not a shock, but the sages don’t agree. Not only were they not alive when the Temple stood and these sacrifices were offered, they also have different readings/interpretations of the rulings that came before them.

The idea that a non-priest can help, as long as they don’t walk so that they’re essentially being used as a “bench” is an interesting concept. And one borrowed by many teachers throughout the years as they cast the “less talented” students in their musicals.

So, today’s gem is that we have predecessors to both the casting of a child as an inanimate object, and we also have the predecessor of the bucket brigade.

Today’s gem shows that rabbis can make stupid mistakes AND have no compassion. (So, we’re looking good.)

Rabbi Abbahu ridiculed [megaddef ] this interpretation: If so, how can you find a fit Paschal offering according to ben Beteira? If its owner designated an animal now, on the morning of the fourteenth, as a Paschal offering, it is disqualified from the outset, as it cannot be sacrificed at all, either for its sake or not for its sake. And even if its owner designated it the previous day, when it was fit to be sacrificed not for its sake, it was fit and then disqualified the next morning, when it was no longer fit to be sacrificed until the afternoon. Once an offering is disqualified, it can no longer become fit.

This Hebrew word megaddef, ridicule, was not one I had seen on the daf before. Rabbi Abbahu is basically calling his colleague an idiot. This, in and of itself, would have been enough to catch my eye. At this time of year where we all do self-reflection and try and examine the times we missed the mark, the times we have hurt others, the times we were not our best self – there is something almost comforting in seeing a great rabbi immortalized in the Talmud at a less-then-gracious moment. But, he also has a point: the argument makes no sense! Sometimes, even the best of us act like idiots.

So, lets not be afraid to admit when we’ve been idiots and apologize when we are unkind.

Okay, today’s gem is . . . a name. I was struck reading the daf that it kept referring to “Shimon, brother of Azarya.” Now, normally, a rabbi is referred to as “son of” or just by their name. So, why is this guy referred to as “brother of Azarya”?

It turns out that both of these brothers were 9th generation descendants of Ezra (yes, from “the book of Ezra” in the bible), so they both had lineage and importance. They were also both great scholars, however, Azarya had something Shimon didn’t . . . money.

Azarya was very wealthy and so he was able to devote his life to study. It turns out he wanted that for his brother as well and so he completely took on his brother’s financial needs. Because of this Shimon is referred to as “brother of Azarya.”

It is said that, in Judaism, you get credit for birthing the people you educate. (It’s part of why we say kaddish for our teachers, even if they’re not family.) Today, the daf hints that we also get credit for helping someone afford an education.

As it’s the 10 days of teshuvah and we are supposed to give tedakah, perhaps a donaiton to an education fund is in order.

A perfect gem to Rosh haShana:

The mishna teaches: Rabbi Eliezer says: The guilt offering, too, is unfit when sacrificed not for its sake. With regard to this it is taught in a baraita: Rabbi Eliezer said: A sin offering is brought for committing a transgression and a guilt offering is brought for committing a transgression. Just as a sin offering sacrificed not for its sake is unfit, so too, a guilt offering sacrificed not for its sake is unfit.

Yesterday, we were throwing bread crumbs into the water to “toss away” our sins. This text reminds us that we really should have intention. When we apologize, we need to name what we are apologizing for. When we admit our sins, we should really examine ourselves and ask what we did wrong. What are we trying to change? To rid ourselves of? For what are we holding guilt?

Okay, my gem today if that the rabbis decide which sacrifices can be accidentally replace by others and it be “fit” by if the same people can eat them.

Rather, the answer should be emended: Offerings that are eaten by every Jewish person are diverted to serve as offerings eaten by every Jewish person, i.e., peace offerings. But offerings eaten by every Jewish person are not diverted to serve as offerings not eaten by every Jewish person, i.e., sin offerings and guilt offerings, which are eaten only by priests.

Bon appatite!