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

Did you know the priests carried switch blades? Yep. And apparently they kept them in today’s gem, the: Chamber of Knives.

Now, I had never heard of the Chamber of Knives, so I deep a deep dive. If you ever used to watch MTV’s show “Cribs” then this will resonate, because apparently there was an entire room JUST to hold the knives of the priests. And each priest had his own private cabinet (priests had lockers!). And, what did they do if a knive got dull or damaged? They had another entire room just to stash their rusty old knives!

That’s high status, to have a room just for things you use and another for things you don’t and never will.

Is it ever good to be envious?

On our daf today, Rabbi Yishmael compares the burnt offering blood placement to the placement Moses made when inaugurating the Mishkan (Tabernacle in the desert). Ge says, Just as there, with regard to the sin offering, the blood was placed discretely and with four placements, one on each corner, so too here, with regard to a burnt offering, it must be placed discretely and with four placements. However, they don’t place it with the four placements. So, why not? Apparently because there is no base in the southeast corner. The Gemara asks: What is the reason that there was no base on the southeast corner of the altar? Rabbi Elazar says: Because it was not in the portion of land of the one who tears, i.e., the tribe of Benjamin.

Here’s the gem: Rabbi Levi bar Ḥama says that Rabbi Ḥama, son of Rabbi Ḥanina, says: A strip of land emerged from the portion of Judah and entered into the portion of Benjamin, and the southeast corner of the base was on that strip. And the tribe of Benjamin the righteous would agonize over it every day, desiring to take it into its portion, due to its unique sanctity. . . Therefore, Benjamin the righteous was privileged and became the host of the Holy One, Blessed be He, as the Holy of Holies was built in his portion. As it is stated: “And He dwells between his shoulders.”

Benjamin (Jacob’s son, the brother of Joseph) had a vision that the altar would not be in his allotted portion and was so heartbroken over it that God rewarded him by building the Holy of Holies in his apportioned land.

So, is it ever good to be envious? When it causes you to be a better version of yourself, when it helps you to get your priorities and desires in order, then (and only then) envy can be a holy thing. When it brings us closer to God, then, yes, it’s good to be envious.

I have written emails and forgotten to hit send. One of my sons had an assignment he did and uploaded but forgot to hit submit. And then there all the many projects I have started and never finished . . . Today’s daf reminds us that, if we don’t finish the job then we don’t get credit for doing the job.

Rabbi Yehuda said to him: For what reason do we not say: If he finished, he has performed atonement, but if he did not finish, he has not performed atonement? This derivation would indicate that if one of any of the blood placements is lacking it is as though he did nothing.

Follow through is key in life. Hit send, hit submit, finish what you start.

Good little gem today:

The mishna teaches with regard to the sin offerings whose blood is presented inside the Sanctuary: As to the remainder of the blood which is left after the sprinklings, a priest would pour it onto the western base of the external altar. The Gemara asks: What is the reason that it must be poured on the western base? The Gemara answers: The verse states with regard to the bull offering of the High Priest: “And the priest shall sprinkle the blood upon the corners of the altar of sweet incense before the Lord, which is in the Tent of Meeting; and all the remaining blood of the bull he shall pour out at the base of the altar of burnt offering, which is at the entrance of the Tent of Meeting” (Leviticus 4:7). This means that he must pour it on that base which he encounters first when he leaves the Tent of Meeting, which is the western base.

The gem here is that the priests pours the remains at the first base he encounters, that means the first opportunity he has to do the mitzah he does it!

We should all learn from that – do mitzvahs right away, wherever you encounter them.

To read today’s daf, you need to understand some Talmudic terms that all are ways of deriving laws based on other laws. Steinsaltz defines the terms:

 Hekesh – is an analogy. When two cases are mentioned together in the same passage or in adjacent passages, we can assume that since they are juxtaposed, they are analogous. For this reason, legal inferences may be drawn by comparing the two cases. On rare occasions, such as in our case, the analogy may be stated explicitly in the Torah.

Gezeira shava – is a verbal analogy. If the same word or phrase appears in two places in the Torah, we may infer on the basis of “verbal analogy” that the same law must apply in the other case, as well.

Kal vaḥomer – is an a fortiori inference. This is a rule of logical argumentation by means of which a comparison is drawn between two cases, one lenient and the other stringent. Kal vaḥomer asserts that if the law is stringent in a case where we are usually lenient, then it will certainly be stringent in a more serious case; likewise, if the law is lenient in a case where we are usually not lenient, then it will certainly be lenient in a less serious case.

Binyan av – is an interpretation based on paradigm. While there are different types of binyan av, the simplest form of binyan av follows the logical pattern “just as we find in Case A that Law X applies, so too we may infer that in Case B, which is similar to Case A, law X should apply.”

Vocab is our gem!!

Today we learn that the sin offerings must be offered in the north. We learned previously that this is where the olah offerings were given as well! What a lesson, people who see others bringing the offerings will not know if they’ve sinned or not and will not be embarrassed… as long as they’re the kind of person to give a free will offering.

On our daf today we get a section of Mishnah that is read everyday as it’s included in the traditional prayer book!!

MISHNA: What is the location of the slaughtering and consumption of offerings? The principle is that with regard to offerings of the most sacred order, their slaughter is in the north of the Temple courtyard.

The passage discusses the specific sacrifices that take place on Yom Kippur, and the location of the blood sprinkling.  (Including when the priest collects blood…in his hands!)

The best part is why this section was selected… because it has no arguments!!!! No: rabbi A says this but Rabbi B says that. No, “you might have thought.” What will the Tamkins even look like without the Rabbis fighting over its meaning?! Over the next couple of days we shall see.

Why is a section of Talmud included in the prayer book? 1) So we get credit for studying Talmud every day and 2) because prayer replaced the sacrifices described in Zevachim.

Sometimes the daf uses a word I don’t know. (Okay that happens a lot.) Today, I clicked on the word נוּמִי numi as the verse says נוּמִי רַבִּי שִׁמְעוֹן numi Rabbi Shimon instead of the usual words. The divtionary said “ulcer” which makes no sense. So, a long dive later, I learned that Rashi says it means that Rabbi Shimon was making his ruling from his deathbed. What a wonderful gem, that we should be learning, teaching, and studying even on our death bed.

Today’s gem is the BIGGEST gem of the entire tractate! It answers the question: Why are we even studying this? There is no Temple to offer sacrifices!

Does one issue a halakha for the messianic period, when the Temple will be rebuilt? Abaye said to him: If that is so, that such halakhot are not taught, let the tanna not teach all the halakhot of the slaughter of sacrificial animals, i.e., tractate Zevaḥim, as it is entirely a halakha for the messianic period. Rather, one studies these halakhot due to the principle of: Study Torah and receive reward, i.e., one is rewarded for the study of Torah regardless of its practical applicability. Here too, study Torah and receive reward.

Why are we even studying this? Should we really be issuing laws that have no relevancy? Should we really spend so much time examining and arguing about what will happen in the Temple, the Temple which will not be rebuilt until the time of the Messiah?

We get the answer – we are rewarded for studying it, even if we cannot apply it to the Temple.

All the more so, we are rewarded for studying it if we can apply it’s lessons to our lives today, a world that has not been redeemed.