Daf Ditty Pesachim 98: Silence Munich Manuscript 95 (1342 CE) Location: Cod. hebr. 95 pg. 0129 Source: www.digitale-sammlungen.de 1 Pirkei Avot 1:17 Rumi wrote much about silence. Does that seem strange? Poets live with silence: the silence before the poem; the silence whence the poem comes; . the silence in between the words, as you drink the words, watch them glide through your mind, feel them slide down your throat towards your heart; the silence which you share with the poet when the poem ends, sitting side by side, feeling one another being one heart; the silence after the poem, when you are a different person from the person who started reading the poem, think differently, move differently, act differently; know Rumi a little better as a friend; know yourself a little more as a friend. Rumi was asked, why do you talk, talk, talk, so much about silence? 2 He said, the radiant one inside me has said nothing. And that’s the silence which we listen to and hear in Rumi’s heart, here, sitting in the cool shade which the scent of roses seems to love, while the fountain gently plays like a poet with sound and silence. Michael Shepherd 3 4 If the paschal lambs of two groups get mixed up each group shall select one of the animals. One person from each group must join the other group. And this is their declaration: If this paschal lamb is ours, you hereby secede from yours and subscribe to ours; and if this paschal lamb is yours, we hereby secede from ours and subscribe to yours. The same applies even to five groups or five people or ten groups of ten people: one person secedes from each group and they make the declaration. If the paschal lambs of just two people get mixed up, each must select one animal. Then each must get another person from the market to subscribe to his animal. Now one from each group must approach the other and declare: If this paschal lamb is mine you hereby secede from yours and subscribe to mine; if the paschal lamb is yours I hereby secede from mine and subscribe to yours. Rabbi Simchah Roth writes:1 1: The two last mishnayot of Chapter 9 require us to consider certain regulations concerning the paschal lamb and to imagine certain conditions as prevailing. I have combined these two mishnayot, as it were, since essentially they deal with one and the same topic. This topic is how to deal with a situation in which paschal animals have become mixed up. 2: Once a paschal animal has been selected as the intended sacrifice every effort must be made to prevent a situation in which it becomes ownerless. The term 'ownerless' here does not refer to the person from whose flock the animal was selected; it refers to the fact that from the moment of selection the animal is designated as belonging to anyone and everyone who subscribes to its group. Once selected a paschal lamb should only be offered by a representative member of that particular subscription group, and, having been sanctified as it were by virtue of its being designated the animal must not be allowed to fail to fulfill its designated function. 3: Let us imagine a situation which was hinted at in the previous mishnah. It is the afternoon of Nisan 14th; we are members of a subscription group assembled in the Outer Court of the Bet Mikdash awaiting the turn of our representative to enter and slaughter our lamb. There is an immense throng of animals - both human and ruminant. In the crush we momentarily lose contact with our animal at the same time as the same thing happens to an animal of another group. We all discover our two lambs in mutual communion and now it is not possible to know which of the two animals is the one we have 1 http://www.bmv.org.il/shiurim/pesachim/pes09.html 5 designated and which the one that they have designated. We have a double halakhic quandary. We can only sacrifice the lamb that we have designated and we don't know which one it is. On the other hand, we cannot let both animals loose and buy two more animals in the handy market which is doing a roaring trade in this very courtyard because a designated animal must meet its fate. 4: The solution outlined in Mishnah 10 is now clear. Each of the two groups takes charge of one of the two animals. One person from each group must now 'cross the lines' and join the other group. A situation has now been created in which at least one person in each group 'owns' the lamb in question. In order to verbally clarify the situation all the other members of the group must address the new member (presumably in chorus) the the following effect: 'If this paschal lamb is, in fact the one that we originally designated, you are hereby deemed to have seceded from your original lamb and to have subscribed to ours; on the other hand, if this paschal lamb was originally designated by you as a member of your previous group, we are hereby deemed to have seceded from our original lamb and have now subscribed to yours.' Problem neatly solved. 5: This solution would apply even if it were not just two groups that were involved, but five groups or even ten groups: the groups must be reconstituted so that at least one person in each group could have been an original owner, in theory, of the animal now associated with the group. 6: The problem is compounded, however, if we are only two people whose lambs have become mixed up; and this is the situation addressed by mishnah 11. The solution outlined in mishnah 10 will not work in such a situation for obvious reasons. Therefore, it is necessary to create a situation in which its provisions can be applied. Each of us invites one other person in the marketplace to join us; thus we now constitute two discrete groups of two. Now that each group consists of more than one person it is possible to apply the solution outlined in mishnah 10: one of the two in each group changes groups and they can make their mutual declarations as outlined in the mishnah. 6 MISHNA: With regard to a group whose Paschal lamb was lost, and they said to one member of the group: Go and search for our Paschal lamb, and when you find it, slaughter it on our behalf; and he went and found the missing offering and 7 slaughtered it on behalf of the entire group, but in the meantime they took a different animal and slaughtered it as a Paschal lamb, the halakha is as follows: If his Paschal lamb was slaughtered first, he eats from his offering, as he is considered to be registered specifically for that offering, and they eat with him from his offering, because he included them in his offering and it belongs to the entire group. The second animal does not have any registrants and is therefore burned. And if theirs was slaughtered first, they eat from theirs because they withdrew from the original offering through the act of slaughtering a replacement, and he eats from his because he was not registered for the replacement offering sacrificed by the remainder of his group. 8 And if it is not known which of the offerings was slaughtered first, or if both the group and the individual slaughtered them together, he eats from his and they do not eat with him in case theirs was slaughtered first, and theirs must be taken out to the place designated for burning. The offering slaughtered by the group may not be eaten due to the concern that it was slaughtered second and the members of the group would therefore have been included in the first offering. However, they are exempt from performing the offering of the Paschal lamb on the second Pesaḥ, because they were included in the slaughter of whichever animal was slaughtered first. It is only due to external circumstances that they cannot complete the mitzva by eating the Paschal lamb, and this does not prevent them from fulfilling their obligation. 9 10 And if it is not known which of the offerings was slaughtered first, or if both the group and the individual slaughtered them together, he eats from his and they do not eat with him in case theirs was slaughtered first, and theirs must be taken out to the place designated for burning. The offering slaughtered by the group may not be eaten due to the concern that it was slaughtered second and the members of the group would therefore have been included in the first offering. However, they are exempt from performing the offering of the Paschal lamb on the second Pesaḥ, because they were included in the slaughter of whichever animal was slaughtered first. It is only due to external circumstances that they cannot complete the mitzva by eating the Paschal lamb, and this does not prevent them from fulfilling their obligation. 11 A somewhat different case of a lost Paschal lamb would occur if the group had sent one member as an agent to search for the lost animal, and the agent said to the other members of the group before he left: If I am late, go and slaughter a Paschal lamb for me. He then went and found the lost Paschal lamb and slaughtered it, and they took another animal and slaughtered it as a Paschal lamb.