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

Today’s gem . . . sexy elbows.

Basically, the rabbis are debating if a woman is liable for injury to an animal if she comes to a house to prepare food and the animal eats it and gets sick/dies. We read:

In the case of a woman who entered the house of a homeowner without permission in order to grind wheat, and the homeowner’s animal ate the wheat, he is exempt? And moreover, if the homeowner’s animal was injured by the wheat, the woman is liable. The Gemara infers: The reason she is liable is specifically that she entered without permission, but if she entered with permission, she would be exempt. The Sages said in response: If she entered the house to grind wheat, since she does not require any privacy, the owners of the courtyard do not need to absent themselves from there, and the responsibility for safeguarding against damage therefore rests upon them. But if she enters to bake, since she requires privacy for this, as the process of kneading involves exposing her elbows, the owners of the courtyard absent themselves from there to allow her to bake. Therefore, the responsibility for safeguarding against damage to anything in the courtyard rests upon her.

Yep. If elbows will be exposed, the men have to leave the room. It’s just plain obscene.

Oy, if they saw what people wear now . . .or I should say don’t wear.

But it does remind me of when my grandmother, an orthodox woman, went with my grandfather to meet his family in Mea Shearim, an Ultraorthodox neighborhood in Jerusalem. She was wearing a long, modest dress, but her elbows were showing. Someone threw a rock at her for being so brazen. So, maybe things haven’t changed that much.

We have seen in the Talmud, discussion of a fetus being part of the mother . . . when it’s a human. In the past couple of days, the daf has been discussing how to access damage if a pregnant animal is either injured or causes damage and there is a question about if the fetus is part of the assessment.

Rava says: In the case of a cow that caused damage while pregnant, the injured party collects compensation from its offspring, i.e., the offspring that had been a fetus at the time of the goring. What is the reason? It is because it is considered an integral part of its body and therefore may be used to collect payment.

Love this because it confirms, again, that a fetus is a part of the mother until it’s born. Only after it is born is it considered a separate living entity. This is such a fact of Talmud that it holds the offspring liable for participating in what its mother did when it was a fetus as it’s considered to have been part of her.

More oxen on the daf! But, amidst what seems to be an epidemic of violent oxen, there is this gem:

From where is it derived that a court first attends only to the arguments of the claimant and only afterward attends to the counterclaims of the defendant and discusses them? As it is stated: “Whoever has a cause, let him come near [yiggash] to them,” which is interpreted to mean that whoever has a claim against another should submit [yaggish] his claim to them first before the defendant.

As a teacher, I love this. How many times is it hard to get a true story of what happened because the two (or more) individuals involved are arguing with one another or talking on top of the other? They are responding to what the other person said and not really being helpful to the “judge” who is trying to figure out what’s what.

So, one at a time. The claimant first, then the defendant.

But there is another gem as well.

The Sages of Neharde’a say that despite this principle, sometimes a court attends to the defendant first and listens to his defense before discussing the arguments of the claimant. What are the circumstances where this occurs? This occurs in a case where his assets are depreciating because of the claim against him. In that situation, the court allows him to present his arguments first so that he can sell his assets at their true price.

Also wonderful! There are times where claims against someone will ruin their livelihood and reputation! In these cases we need to hear from them before just the accusation ruins them (as it’s completely possible they will ne found to be innocent).

Both gems are striving to find justice in the fastest and least damaging way possible.

We take a lot of steps to keep ourselves, and those we love, safe. But sometimes, the only way we can guarantee safety is by not participating. On our daf today, the rabbis are debating what it means to safeguard an ox. Does it need the most stringent forms of guarding, or more minimal? What is sufficient in terms of guarding the ox?

Rabbi Eliezer, who says that an ox has no sufficient safeguarding at all other than slaughtering it with a knife;

Rabbi Eliezer is the extreme example. The only way you can guarantee and ox won’t gore (whether it’s been warned or not, gored previously or not) is to kill it. Now, does Eliezer think that our world would be better without any oxen? Certainly not. The point he is making is that we can’t guard against every possibility. We can only do so much. All life has risk. The important thing is living it.

Guess what’s on the daf? You’re right – more about a goring ox! But today gives us a new Mishna that might have a nice gem inside.

MISHNA: With regard to an ox that is leaving court to be stoned for killing a person and its owner then consecrated it, it is not considered consecrated, i.e., the consecration does not take effect, since deriving benefit from the ox is prohibited and the ox is therefore worthless. If one slaughtered it, its flesh is forbidden to be eaten and it is prohibited to derive benefit from it. But if its owner consecrated it before its verdict the ox is considered consecrated, and if he slaughtered it its flesh is permitted.

There is something about this. It seems kind of sweet that the owner is trying to save the ox from its death sentence. But that’s not what makes it special. What makes it special is the idea that an ox that has killed could still be elevated to holy status. That it might still serve something holy.
If it’s true for an ox, all the more so for us. No matter our past and what we’ve done, we might still be able to dedicate ourselves to the Holy.

Today’s daf tells us that there is a difference between an ox that intentionally causes harm, and one who, in the corse of doing normal “ox things” accidentally causes harm.

True for us as well.

More than 20 of the Israeli soldiers who have died thus far died in accidents, unintentional misfires (called “friendly fire”). The amount of heartbreak for every death is impossibly overwhelming. But it being an accident is particularly disturbing and hard. There is no one to blame, to hold to account.

May God protect our soldiers and bring them home safe and successful – and with no accidents.

I often love the turns of phrase that the Talmud uses. Today’s daf gives us a good one:

This is analogous to a fisherman pulling fish from the sea. When he finds big ones he takes them, and when he finds small ones he takes them as well. Here too, although Rabbi Eliezer’s first explanation was sufficient, he added an additional response, despite the fact that it was not as good as the first. By contrast, Rav Tavyumei said in the name of Rava that he first said to him the explanation involving inconclusive testimony asserting that the ox killed, since this is analogous to a fisherman pulling fish from the sea, who finds small ones and takes them, and when he then finds big ones, he discards the small ones and takes only the big ones. Here too, once Rabbi Eliezer thought of a better response to Rabbi Akiva’s question, he suggested it instead of the first.

So, finding multiple explanations is compared to fishing and keeping the small fish and the large.

I can think of so many applications, but the one I will share for me is reducing meat intake. The first reasoning I was presented with was the abuse that some animals experience on the farm (not all farms are the same). Then came the inhumane living quarters for the animals. Then came farm workers not being paid living wages (again, not all farms are the same). Then came the antibiotics fed to animals that are fed to us. Then that chickens are dipped in bleach. Then, when I got cancer, I was told that the animals are hopped up on hormones and I should avoid them. . . but, I didn’t start reducing my meat consumption until I learned of the full environmental impact of the meat industry. The rivers of feces, the Amazon being leveled to make way for grazing land for cows (and those cows toxic farts), that if we all just gave up meat for one day a week, it would be the equivalent of every car switching to electric. . .

Big fish, little fish, you never know which will tip the scale.

On today’s daf, one think that struck my is Rabbi Eliezer’s concern of what Akiva thinks of him. Twice our daf says:

Rabbi Eliezer said to him: Akiva, is this how I appear in your eyes?

He worries that Akiva would think that he would teach/think a certain way – and that if Akiva does, that he doesn’t know him, or respect him.

I’ve known this feeling many times. It feels like a betrayal. You think someone understands you, but then thinks you would say or do or believe something so not you…

Rabbi Eliezer was Akiva’s teacher. He loved Akiva so much and thought him so wise that he quickly became his colleague. But now, it looks as though Eliezer feels betrayed by Akiva in that he thought Akiva knew him better than he appears to. His student became his colleague and then made him feel gaslit.

Is this how I appear in your eyes?

It’s a little heartbreaking.

As we have been studying the story of a ox that repeatedly gores others, a colleague said that the “forewarned” must be referring to the owner of the ox and not the ox itself. Yet, we see that animals are smart and can be trained in how to act. (I see dogs be so patient with toddlers, even dobermans and pitbulls.) Our daf today delineates between an ox that gores of its own volition, and one that has been trained to kill.

The mishna teaches that a stadium ox is not liable to be put to death, since it was trained to gore.

I think of ancient gladiators fighting animals (which is the Roman world these rabbis lived in) and modern bull fighters . . .

A dilemma was raised before the Sages: If an ox kills a person it may not be brought as an offering, even if it is not put to death. If a stadium ox kills a person, what is the halakha with regard to sacrificing it on the altar? Rav says that it is fit to be brought as an offering, and Shmuel says that it is disqualified. Rav says that the ox is fit because it acted due to circumstances beyond its control, as goring is what it was trained to do; and Shmuel says that it is disqualified as, in any event, a transgression was committed through it.

Here they debate if a “stadium ox” can be brought as a sacrifice. Normally, an animal that kills cannot be brought as a sacrifice, but what if it was forced?

This is my gem today, not because of the question of the ox, but because the question is one we ask of people as well. Clearly we hold individuals who kill of their own volition and individuals who kill because they are forced to in very different lights. But how do they view themselves? We see those who steal out of necessity differently than those who kill simply for personal gain.

And I think of King David, who wanted to build the Temple, who raised the money, but then, as we read David’s words in I Chronicles 28, “But God said to me, ‘You are not to build a house for my Name, because you are a warrior and have shed blood.'”

Every ruler makes choices that mean life of death for others. Engaging in war or not – lives will be taken because of that choice. It’s an insane amount of pressure. Yet Solomon was worthy, and David not. He crossed a line. . . and yet, over 1000 years later, children continue singing his name.

I so admire soldiers. I am eternally grateful to them for their protection and bravery. For their willingness to really give their lives to something bigger than themselves. For good soldiers, there is no joy in killing, it’s all done in “circumstances beyond their control;” yet it leaves a mark.

May we live in a world where no one ever feels they have to take the life of another. May we live in times of peace.

At the beginning of our daf today, the rabbis worry that, if they tell someone that their fine an individual by telling them that they need to give to charity, that they’ll never give.

The Gemara suggests: But let him give the fine to the poor. Rav Mari said: This is not done, because it is money that has no claimants. Since one would not be liable to give it to a specific poor person, the criminal could evade payment by responding to any claimant that he wants to give it to a different poor person.

You can see it, can’t you? Someone is punished by being told to give to the poor, and he tells every poor person that he is giving to someone else. No justice is done! People still do this, claim they can’t give because they gave elsewhere, or don’t have anything to give. Which reminds me:

Rabbi Rafael of Barshad (19th century Europe) had a concern about the questions he would be asked when he died and went to heven. He said: “When I get to Heaven, they’ll ask me, why didn’t you learn more Torah? And I’ll tell them that I’m slow-witted. Then they’ll ask me, why didn’t you do more kindness for others? And I’ll tell them that I’m physically weak. Then they’ll ask me, why didn’t you give more tzedakah? And I’ll tell them that I didn’t have enough money.
But then they’ll ask me: If you were so stupid, weak and poor, why were you so arrogant? And for that I won’t have an answer.”