BSD

Shkolim – 9a (2)

29 Nisan 5784. 05/07/2024

A few short notes:

1 – Having discussed the שיעור רביעית our גמרא diverged to discuss some הלכות pertaining to הלכות טומאה.

2 – Story of the ‘mule belonging to רבי’.

In general, a Kosher and Non Kosher בהמה or חיה that died is טמא. The שיעור is a minimum of a כזית.

A Kosher animal that went thru שחיטה is not טמא.

The issue with this famous mule was the blood of this נבילה.

Is דם נבילה in general טמא, like its flesh? If yes – what is the shiur?

3 – רבי had a רב in his court that ruled on שאלות. Interestingly his name was like רבי!

רבי יהודה.

So the Rov ruled that this דם נבילה of this mule was טהור. But that was ambiguous (to the next generation) as to why he ruled as such.

Either because his opinion was that דם נבילה in general is טהור, or דם נבילה in general is טמא but in this particular case it lacked a שיעור- which is a רביעית.

That was the topic of our גמרא.

4 – The next section discussed an incident when one אמורא asked another about the above topic. Instead of answering the question he shrugged him off. Or worse -בעט ביה. When asked why he acted in this non תלמיד חכם fashion he had a very interesting reply:

‘I can’t think straight as I am penniless and have no clue where I’ll get some breakfast tomorrow’.

The גמרא talks about this phenomena and how it’s hinted to in the תוכחה.

The רבונו של עולם needs to give us wealth so that we should be able to think clearly!

5 – In relation to this we mentioned the אבות דרבי נתן that states (אדר״נ פל״א ה״א)

רבי אחאי בן יאשיה אומר ……זמן שאדם אוכל משלו דעתו מיושבת עליו ואפילו אוכל אדם משל אביו ומשל אמו ומשל בניו אין דעתו מיושבת עליו ואין צריך לומר משל אחרים:

Rabbi Ahai ben Yoshaya would say: When a person eats from his own farm, his mind is calm. However,  when a person eats food from his father’s or mother’s farm, or from his children’s farm, his mind is not calm – not to mention when he eats food from a stranger’s farm.

6 – On the above vein, the בנין יהושע  make a reference to an interesting ירושלמי in ערלה.

Very briefly:

There is מרכיב- Grafting. Which is actually splicing a twig from a selected tree to a root stock of the same or different species.

Then there is מבריך – Layering. One takes a branch of a bush or some low growing plant and buries it into the soil, waits for a few months and then, after it has rooted, cuts it off and plants it somewhere else.

Now, when layering, the branch develops roots in the ground. Before it is cut off from the tree it is receiving ‘life’ from both – the tree and the new roots.

Question: Which is the primary source of nourishment? Is it from the old tree or, because of its own roots- meaning it is a stand alone ‘new tree’. The answer manifest itself in הלכה in regards to ערלה.

If it is a new tree then the count for ערלה begins anew.

The ירושלמי  says that there is a simple way to tell where the main source of nourishment to this new branch is coming from.

Look at the leaves that are growing on this new branch. Where is it facing?

If it is facing away from the old tree, it means that it is still receiving חיות from the tree. It is facing away because ‘one cannot look in the face of the one that is feeding you’!

However if the leaves are facing the old ‘mother’ tree, then it is living from the new roots….

That is the meaning of

וְנָא אַל תַּצְרִיכֵנוּ ה’ אֱלהֵינוּ לא לִידֵי מַתְּנַת בָּשָׂר וָדָם וְלא לִידֵי הַלְוָאָתָם, כִּי אִם לְיָדְךָ הַמְּלֵאָה, הַפְּתוּחָה, הַקְּדוֹשָׁה וְהָרְחָבָה, שֶׁלּא נֵבוֹשׁ וְלא נִכָּלֵם לְעוֹלָם וָעֶד

7 – The גמרא says that the person who entered the שקלים chamber would be constantly talking the his friend on the outside. This was to ensure that he would not try to place some coins in his mouth. The גמרא asks that we could also accomplish this by having him enter with a mouth full of water…..

The גמרא responds that it would create an issue with a ברכה.

What ברכה? Some suggest that he may swallow some of the water with out making a ברכה.

The חכם צבי writes that is incorrect since one can make שהכל on water prior to entering! He suggest that it is a ברכה of על הפרשת תרומה.

We discussed as there is no particular  מצוה  for this stage of מחצית השקל.

But see here an interesting idea from the  שו”ת פני מבין. OC 1, 5. 31.

The Chamber of the Shekels

The final act of removing the coins from the chamber into the קופות is the culmination of the מצות מחצית השקל. Indeed t is only then that a ברכה can be made.