This tractate has been exceptional in many respects. Until now, we were studying the Babylonian Talmud, but this tractate was originally composed for the Jerusalem Talmud and, in keeping with the style of that Talmud, is far more laconic than other texts we have studied.

We are still in the second order of the Talmud (called Moed), the section dealing with holidays, but in this tractate we found ourselves discussing a very different matter — the collection of the half-shekel Temple tax and the general bureaucratic procedures necessary for keeping God’s house in good working order.

Before this tractate, we had mostly seen the rabbis wrestle with matters we think of as “religious,” but the concerns of this tractate seem far more “secular.” (The truth is, the rabbis did not draw a distinction between religious and secular law as we do in the present day.) 

All of which can make this little tractate seem completely archaic — with no obvious connection to contemporary Jewish practice. After all, we don’t have a Temple, so we don’t set aside the half shekel tax — right?

Right! On the last page of the tractate, we receive this confirmation. In most of the Talmud, we find the rabbis thinking, teaching, arguing about the Temple as if it were still standing. But of course, the Temple was not standing. It had been destroyed in 70 C.E. and a disastrous attempt at bringing about its return, the Bar Kochba Revolt, had only made reconstruction seem more remote. Yet the rabbis did not give up hope.

As we close this chapter, we see one of those rare rabbinic discussions that acknowledges the present, Temple-free reality of the rabbis. It begins with a mishnah:

The obligations to give a half shekel to the Temple and bring first fruits are practiced only in the presence of a Temple, though the obligations of grain tithes, animal tithes and sanctification of firstborn animals take place whether or not there is a Temple.

However, if (in the present day with no Temple) one does set aside a half shekel or first fruits, these are consecrated. Rabbi Shimon says: This does not apply to first fruits (even if set aside, they are not consecrated).

Without a Temple, the rabbis reason, Jews are not obligated to set aside a half shekel each year. The Gemara discusses what happens if one accidentally does so anyway: the half shekel is thrown into the Dead Sea — a super salty abyss that will ensure no one can accidentally benefit from the sacred funds that now belong to God. Likewise with other items consecrated in the absence of a Temple. Accidentally consecrated clothing is burned. An accidentally consecrated animal is destroyed: it is closed in its stall and allowed to starve to death. Please, everyone, do not accidentally consecrate your animals.

There is also a view that maybe the consecration of shekels in the absence of a Temple is simply invalid — it doesn’t work. The Gemara reasons this might likewise apply to a quarter dinar of silver that a new convert might consecrate in order to purchase a pair of doves for an offering. But then again, maybe that quarter dinar of silver is consecrated after all because, as we read in one of the last lines in this tractate:

Perhaps the Temple will be rebuilt as at first.

What they clearly mean is that perhaps the Temple will be rebuilt in the lifetime of that convert. As Jews now still say in the traditional daily prayers, they hoped it might be rebuilt “speedily in our own day.”

Read all of Shekalim 22 on Sefaria.

This piece originally appeared in a My Jewish Learning Daf Yomi email newsletter sent on April 12th, 2021. If you are interested in receiving the newsletter, sign up here.

The post Shekalim 22 appeared first on My Jewish Learning.

— Pirke Avot 3:21

We know that a dead body imparts impurity and that certain kinds of blood (menstrual blood, for instance) also impart impurity. But what about blood from a dead animal?

Today’s conversation centers on the death of a mule from Rabbi Yehuda HaNasi’s household whose blood was declared to be ritually pure. With regard to this incident, we learn that, in small quantities, this blood does not impart impurity — but in large quantities it does:

Rabbi Elazar asked Rabbi Simon: Up to how much blood (does not render one ritually impure)?

And he did not answer him.

He then went and asked Rabbi Yehoshua ben Levi.

Rabbi Yehoshua ben Levi, said to him: Up to the size of a quarter log is ritually pure; more than that is ritually impure.

Rabbi Elazar was annoyed that Rabbi Simon did not respond with the halakhah.

In this exchange, Rabbi Shimon is either reluctant to divulge the answer (one quarter log, or about one third of a cup), or he does not know. This irritates Rabbi Elazar. But his irritation is nothing to what happens in this next story about the same question:

Rav Beivai was sitting and teaching this story of the mule from Rabbi Yehuda HaNasi’s household, in which the sages ruled that the blood of a carcass does not render one impure.

Rabbi Yitzhak bar Bisna said to him: Up to how much blood from an animal carcass does not render one ritually impure?

Rav Beivai said to him: Up to a quarter log is ritually pure; more than that is impure.

And then he (Rav Beivai) kicked him (Rabbi Yitzhak).

Wait, he kicked him? Like the mule in the story might have (if it were still alive)? Above, Rabbi Elazar was annoyed when Rabbi Shimon failed to supply the answer. Here, Rav Beivai is clearly beyond put out at being asked.

Now, to be fair, Rabbi Yitzhak was a bit of a yutz at times (he once lost the keys to the house of study, and because it was Shabbat, no one could carry another set over to open the synagogue). Moreover, we could read the story to understand that Rabbi Yitzhak either was interrupting or simply wasn’t paying attention when Rav Bevai supplied the answer himself. (In a similar version of this story in Tractate Menachot, Rabbi Yitzhak’s question is more of a challenge, and Rav Beivai is simply silent in response.) Even so, Rav Beivai’s mulish reaction here still seems unreasonable and disproportionate.

Rav Beivai’s colleague Rabbi Zerika seems just as flabbergasted as we might be, declaring: You kicked him because he asked you a question? This gives Rav Beivai a chance to account for his behavior. He begins by explaining: Because my mind was unsettled, and not because he did anything wrong. 

Rav Beivai follows this up with a midrash, quoted in the name of Rabbi Hanin, about the fear that accompanies poverty — the anxiety of not knowing if one will be able to feed oneself or one’s family. He admits that his unfortunate reflex to plant a boot into his colleague, however earnest or legitimate his question, is rooted in his food insecurity. He doesn’t offer this as an excuse, but as an explanation.

Sadly, some 2000 years later, food insecurity is still a huge problem — around the world, even in developed countries. Rav Beivai wasn’t alone then, and he isn’t now. Nothing excuses resorting to physical force, but the impact of food insecurity goes beyond just how much someone has to eat, with potentially serious emotional and psychological repercussions for those who suffer from it.

Rav Beivai reminds us of the importance of confronting this systemic and persistent problem, as real today as it was hundreds of years ago, and ensuring access to nutritious options in educational settings and beyond. Truly, as Pirkei Avot tells us, without food security, opportunities for learning are closed off to us all. And we can also admire his strength in owning up not only to his behavior, but to his reasons for it. That too takes enormous courage.

Read all of Shekalim 21 on Sefaria.

This piece originally appeared in a My Jewish Learning Daf Yomi email newsletter sent on April 11th, 2021. If you are interested in receiving the newsletter, sign up here.

The post Shekalim 21 appeared first on My Jewish Learning.

Centuries before the Talmud addressed this matter, the Torah had already ruled on this topic:  

If you see your fellow’s ox or sheep gone astray, do not ignore it; you must take it back to your fellow. If your fellow does not live near you or you do not know who he is, you shall bring it home and it shall remain with you until your fellow claims it; then you shall give it back to him …  and so too shall you do with anything that your fellow loses and you find: you must not remain indifferent. (Deuteronomy 22:1-3)

Today’s page, however, is concerned not with returning a lost object or animal to an identifiable owner, but with found objects that are seemingly ownerless (or at least, the owner can’t be readily identified). Examples on today’s daf include a container of wine found in a synagogue, a roasted goat found on the street, a round cheese found in someone’s lodgings and more. (Don’t ask me how someone loses an entire roasted goat.)

In most of these cases, the Gemara’s ruling is “finders keepers.” That is, there is no need to return the now ownerless object that has been presumably left behind by mistake. But just because you don’t have to try to return it, doesn’t mean you shouldn’t, as one rabbi asserts on today’s daf:

Rabbi Mana said in the presence of Rabbi Yosei: But I saw the rabbis announcing that they had found lost property, even when the item was found in a public area (and was therefore presumed ownerless). 

Rabbi Yosei said to him: If you were to find an article in a public area, you would not take it either. Rabbi Yona, your father, did not say this, but said: “If only that when we find some item, we should find it from the gate outward (i.e. in a public area that would not require us to look for the owner).” Even so, when Rabbi Yona found a lost article in a crowded public place, he did not take it for himself.

Rabbi Mana notices that, in fact, the rabbis announce publicly when such objects are found, in the hope that the owners will claim them — and this flummoxes him. What about “finders keepers”? Rabbi Yosei reproves him. His response to Rabbi Mana (in the name of Rabbi Mana’s father, for emphasis) points to an important dictum: just because you can do something, does not mean that you should do it. In this case, it might be permissible to use, eat or otherwise benefit from an ownerless object — but it wouldn’t be right. He appeals to Rabbi Mana’s ethical intuition on this: you would not take it either.

Today, in the wake of the Industrial Revolution, many of us live in a sea of objects and possessions. But not all of us are in that situation — and this was not so for the rabbis who lived in a period of less wealth and far fewer personal possessions. Imagine the person living in the time of the Talmud who put down her full shopping basket, and then forgot where she left it. It’s very possible that if the rabbi didn’t announce its finding in the town square in the hopes that someone would let her know, she and her family would go hungry that night. 

Today, the rabbis wrestle with a distance between what the law requires, as they understand it, and what is intuitively “right” from an ethical standpoint. Clearly, they hope we will all choose the latter.

Read all of Shekalim 20 on Sefaria.

This piece originally appeared in a My Jewish Learning Daf Yomi email newsletter sent on April 10th, 2021. If you are interested in receiving the newsletter, sign up here.

The post Shekalim 20 appeared first on My Jewish Learning.

If money was found on the floor of the Temple between one of the collection horns marked shekels and the collection horn marked free-will offerings, that is to say, between the first and the thirteenth collection horns, the following distinctions apply: If the money was found closer to the horn marked shekels, it is allocated to the shekels; if it was found closer to the horn marked free-will offerings, it is allocated to free-will offerings; and if it was equidistant from the horn marked shekels and the horn marked free-will offerings, it is allocated to free-will offerings. 

The mishnah goes on to discuss money that has fallen between various sets of proximate buckets, and concludes that the money belongs in whichever bucket it is found closest to. When the money is located exactly between two buckets, the funds are allocated to “whichever is more stringent.”

What does this mean, “more stringent”? The Gemara tackles this question, first by disagreeing with the mishnah, arguing that the shekel bucket is more stringent than the free-will bucket:

The mishnah should not have said that the money is allocated to free-will offerings. Rather, it should have said that when money is found equidistant from both, it is allocated to shekels. For the halakhah governing the money in the horn marked shekels is more stringent, as the regular communal offerings are bought with that money, whereas the money in the horn marked free-will offerings is used only to buy offerings for those times when there are no regular offerings being sacrificed. 

In other words, we should allocate found money to the costs we know we have. This is the equivalent of finding a $20 bill in the pocket of your coat and deciding to spend it on an expected cost (paying your taxes) rather than making an optional contribution to a favorite tzedakah. (Or buying ice cream. No judgment.)

But wait! The Gemara brings a different case for us to consider.

Rabbi Yesa said: While I was there in Babylonia, I heard the voice of Rav Yehuda who asked Shmuel the following question: If someone set aside his shekel (for the Temple) and subsequently died, what is to be done with the money?

Shmuel said to him: It is allocated to free-will offerings. 

According to this story of a teaching learned in Babylonia, ownerless money found on the floor of the Temple is like that of a person who allocated a shekel but died before it was conveyed to the Temple treasurer. In that case, it should go to voluntary — not required — offerings. 

What to do now? Concluding this passage, we have a final story that can act as our tie-breaker: 

The high priest could set aside money to be used for the purchase of his daily griddle-cake offering made from one-tenth of an ephah of flour (about eleven cups), half in the morning and half in the evening. If he died before the flour had been bought, what is to be done with the money?

Rabbi Yohanan said: The money must be cast into the Dead Sea (so that it is destroyed).

Rabbi Elazar disagreed and said: The money is allocated to free-will offerings.

Here, we have the case of a high priest who intends to make a grain offering but dies before the flour has been purchased. Rabbi Yohanan suggests that these ownerless funds should be thrown into the ocean! But Rabbi Elazar agrees with Shmuel, and our mishnah: the money goes to voluntary contributions. 

But why are voluntary contributions considered more stringent than obligatory ones? When we think of stringencies, we typically think of obligations: we have to pay our taxes, our mortgage, our water bill. Aren’t these more stringent?

Not when it comes to tzedakah! Our discussion today goes to the heart of giving. Money that we are required to give is not as significant as money that we give on a voluntary basis. Those with a tzedakah plan that includes voluntary contributions are more stringent in observing this mitzvah. This is why found money should go to voluntary contributions.

So that $20 you find in your coat? Maybe give a little extra tzedakah. (I bet you’ll still have enough for some ice cream.)

Read all of Shekalim 19 on Sefaria.

This piece originally appeared in a My Jewish Learning Daf Yomi email newsletter sent on April 9th, 2021. If you are interested in receiving the newsletter, sign up here.

The post Shekalim 19 appeared first on My Jewish Learning.

⁦One who says: “It is incumbent upon me to donate wood to the Temple,” must donate no fewer than two logs for the arrangement on the altar. One who says: “It is incumbent upon me to donate frankincense,” must donate no less than a handful of frankincense, the amount brought with a meal offering. 

The Gemara provides some additional clarity to these rules: Why a two log minimum? Because two logs were added to the altar before the daily morning and afternoon sacrifices. In other words, two logs will be sufficient to complete a task. Likewise, the frankincense — one handful was enough to accompany a meal offering.

You might be wondering: how large were the handfuls? The Gemara specifies that one measures based on the priest with the largest hands. This way, the donation will be large enough to allow the completion of the act no matter which priest is selected to scoop the spice and deliver it to the altar.

These minimums — two logs of wood and one handful of frankincense — do not apply to one who specifies the amount of wood or frankincense that they will give in their verbal pledge. Gifting a single log or a smaller quantity of frankincense to the Temple is permitted if that amount is specified up front.

The Gemara encourages us, when we give, to be specific. We’ll spend a lot of time on this subject, especially in tractates that deal with vows and contract law. The minimums expressed here for the case of a donation of an unspecified amount suggest an ideal benchmark for donation: a donation should be sufficient to fund a complete action.

This is worth considering when we plan our own charitable giving. Is the $18 (based on the value of the word chai (life) in gematria) that many Jews choose as a default for small gifts enough to fund a single action? Perhaps so: such an amount can protect two children from malaria or provide needed vitamin A supplementation to 16 (according to givewell.org). And in any case, our Gemara teaches that a specific gift is laudable no matter its size.

For those in the position to do so, when making a small gift consider investigating how much is required to underwrite a complete task and enhancing the size of your gift to make it happen. If you are not sure what is required, reach out to the recipient and find out. Doing so can add to the value, impact, and meaning to your gift.

Read all of Shekalim 18 on Sefaria.

This piece originally appeared in a My Jewish Learning Daf Yomi email newsletter sent on April 8th, 2021. If you are interested in receiving the newsletter, sign up here.

The post Shekalim 18 appeared first on My Jewish Learning.

A specter haunts all of these: by the time both Talmuds were written (the Jerusalem Talmud in the late 4th century and the Babylonian Talmud some 200 years later) the Temple itself lay firmly and stubbornly in the past. Destroyed in the year 70 C.E., the crushing defeat of the Bar Kochba Revolt some 60 years later made clear that a return to Jerusalem with any sort of Jewish sovereignty, let alone to rebuild the Temple, was far more a dream expressed in prayer than a near-term reality. But that reality rarely intrudes into Tractate Shekalim.

Except today. Suggested, perhaps, by the mishnah’s mention of the Gate of Yechonya (named for the king of Judea who was taken into exile by the Babylonians), the Talmud tells a story about the final days of the First Temple. (Note: This is not the Second Temple, destroyed in 70 C.E., but the first Temple, built by King Solomon, destroyed some five centuries earlier.) According to the rabbis, the destruction was no surprise:

You find that when Nebuchadnezzar (Babylonian king who destroyed the first Temple) came up here… the Sanhedrin (Jewish leadership) came out to greet him and asked him: Has the time come for this house (the Temple) to be destroyed?

This somewhat odd greeting matches, of course, the biblical view of what happened to the First Temple, a view echoing through the prophets of that period, like Jeremiah and First Isaiah: the people sinned, turned away from God, and were punished with destruction and exile. Indeed, driving this point home, the narrative switches to King Yehoyachin (another named for Yechonya) as he confronts the inevitable:

He took the keys to the Holy Temple and went up on the roof. He said before God: Master of the Universe! In the past we were faithful to you and your keys were given to us. Now that we are not faithful, your keys are returned to you.

The Talmud notes that either he threw the keys up and they disappeared, or a hand came from heaven to receive them. Either way, the message is clear: God’s protection of the Temple and its people has been withdrawn — disaster cannot be averted.   

This devastating narrative is about the First Temple, but of course the rebuilt Temple that would eventually have a gate named for the final Judean king also lay in ruins by the time the Mishnah was written down, and had been that way for even longer when the sages of the Talmud began their work. If the presence of the second and even grander Temple was evidence that God’s favor had returned to Israel, the destruction of that Temple meant that God’s protection had seemingly been lost once again. The sages of our Talmud toiled with text before them in that broken world. 

But they learned it still. They worried endlessly over the details of that lost place, concerning themselves with the curtains, the priests, the clothes, the money, the spaces holy and profane inside its gates. Perhaps they did this to ensure that someday, in the future, a new Temple could rise with the look, feel and funding of the old.

The sages of our tradition understood that in the absence of that central heartbeat of ancient Jewish religion, the learning itself would become the center, the force that pulled the people inward, rather than allowing the world to cast them further and further from each other. And we, learning Talmud today, find ourselves engaging with the incredible artifice of their remarkable achievement — an achievement that now, like the Temple of yesteryear, unites Jews and draws them closer to one another in the present day. 

Read all of Shekalim 17 on Sefaria.

This piece originally appeared in a My Jewish Learning Daf Yomi email newsletter sent on April 7th, 2021. If you are interested in receiving the newsletter, sign up here.

The post Shekalim 17 appeared first on My Jewish Learning.

This principle, that charitable giving should preserve the dignity of the recipient, echoes through Jewish tradition and texts. Perhaps most famously, Maimonides (eight levels of tzedakah) regards anonymous giving and receiving as particularly commendable because this dual anonymity — both giver and receiver are unknown to one another — protects the dignity of the recipient.

Protecting the dignity of others is in fact a theme throughout rabbinic literature. But sometimes the means to achieving it are complicated, as the following story illustrates:

Rabbi Hoshaya the Great was the master (i.e. teacher) of the son of a certain blind man and was accustomed to eat with the blind man every day. Once Rabbi Hoshaya had guests, and he did not invite the blind man to eat with him. In the evening, Rabbi Hoshaya went up to visit the blind man and said to him: “I request that my master not be angry with me, as I had guests today. I therefore said to myself that I will not invite you today, so as not to demean my master’s dignity. For this reason, I did not eat with my master today.”

Commentaries explain that the blind man often dropped food on himself and Rabbi Hoshaya wished to spare him the embarrassment of doing so in front of other guests. However good Rabbi Hoshaya’s intentions, I read this and cringe. Citing the blind man’s dignity as a basis for excluding him from the meal flies in the face of contemporary sensibilities of inclusion and equity. It’s difficult to accept the reasoning: I thought other people might make fun of you, so I decided not to invite you at all. He even seems to know it, which is why he approaches the blind man with repeated entreaties of “my master” and offers something between an excuse and a non-apology.

Which makes the blind man’s response surprising:

The blind man said to him: Since you appeased one who is seen but does not see, the Holy One, who sees but is not seen, should accept your appeasement. 

The blind man is quite content with Rabbi Hoshaya’s actions and offers him an eloquent blessing!

If we take the blind man at his word and accept the principle that marginalized people themselves get to decide what constitutes their dignity, perhaps then it is wrong of us to find Rabbi Hoshaya’s approach so lacking. Perhaps we should not judge based on contemporary standards for inclusion. And to his credit, Rabbi Hoshaya broaches the subject directly with the blind man himself (after the fact, but still). And yet, I am still profoundly uncomfortable with Rabbi Hoshaya’s behavior, and it’s hard to see how he merits the beautiful praise that the blind man bestows. 

As we reach toward greater inclusion, always keeping in view that each person is created B’tzelem Elohim, in the image of God, perhaps what we can take from this story is a reminder that we ourselves can and should do better, in part through willingness to have difficult conversations and act in ways we may find challenging so that we can be sure we are respecting the dignity of others.

Read all of Shekalim 15 on Sefaria.

This piece originally appeared in a My Jewish Learning Daf Yomi email newsletter sent on April 5th, 2021. If you are interested in receiving the newsletter, sign up here.

The post Shekalim 15 appeared first on My Jewish Learning.

A certain priest who was going about his duties saw a floor tile that was different from the others. He went and told his fellow priest but did not manage to get all the words out before his soul departed. By this they knew with certainty that this was where the ark was hidden.

The poor priest expired before he could reveal the location of the missing Ark — it’s location was meant to remain a mystery. Sorry, Indiana Jones!

That, of course, doesn’t stop the rabbis from speculating about what it looked like. On today’s page, the rabbis argue endlessly over its precise dimensions and imagine what else was hidden alongside it, including a container of manna, a flask of perfumed oil used to anoint kings and priests (today’s page divulges the recipe), and Aaron’s staff with blossoms and berries.

Beyond these mysterious lost cultic items, there was of course the most precious contents of the Ark: the divine word itself. The rabbis imagine that the Ark contained two sets of the Ten Commandments: the original set that Moses procured on Mount Sinai and then smashed into the Golden Calf, and a second set that he retrieved from God after smashing the first. They also imagine it contained a scroll of the Torah — at least according to Rabbi Meir. Rabbi Tanhuma suggests that the scroll was actually placed in a different box that was kept alongside the Ark.

What did those two sacred tablets look like? Rabbi Hanina ben Gamliel gives us the image with which we are most familiar: five commandments on each tablet. However, there are many other views. One suggests that all Ten Commandments were written on each of the tablets. Ibn Ezra and other commentators speculate that one tablet contained the version of the Ten Commandments found in Exodus and the other contained the slightly different version found in Deuteronomy.

The suggestions get more fanciful. The famous ancient Jewish mystic Rabbi Shimon bar Yohai suggests that the Ten Commandments were written twice on each tablet, for a total of twenty commandments on each. We might imagine that they were written out twice in full or, as one commentator suggests, they were written on one side of the stone but were miraculously visible from the other side. Law refuses to be hidden.

There’s more: Hananya, the nephew of Rabbi Yehoshua, suggests that the stone tablets contained not just the words of the commandments, but also oceans of commentary — as if the words never existed on their own; the project of interpretation began at the precise moment of revelation.

The last image on our page is the most searing:

Rabbi Pinhas in the name of Rabbi Shimon ben Lakish (a.k.a. Reish Lakish): The Torah that the Holy One gave to Moses was given to him as white fire engraved with black fire. It is fire mixed with fire, carved from fire, given from fire, as it is written: At God’s right hand was a fiery law unto them. (Deuteronomy 33:2)

Resh Lakish gives us a glimpse of the awesome primordial Torah — one that existed before creation, before the existence of the flora, fauna and minerals that are necessary for such prosaic things as carved stone tablets, parchment scrolls and ink. This Torah is all fire, all light. The words, even the background, shine brightly outward and contain unknowable depths. We can imagine the words dancing like flames, always in motion even as they hold their place eternally. And this paradoxical image of black fire suggests that even that which is darkest shines intensely. What archaeologist wouldn’t want to dig that out of the ground?

Read all of Shekalim 16 on Sefaria.

This piece originally appeared in a My Jewish Learning Daf Yomi email newsletter sent on April 6th, 2021. If you are interested in receiving the newsletter, sign up here.

The post Shekalim 16 appeared first on My Jewish Learning.

What exactly did Ben Beivai’s job entail? According to one interpretation in our Gemara, he braided shreds of old garments together to prepare wicks for the Temple’s menorah. (The Temple had a huge gold candelabrum with seven branches that was kept perpetually burning. It was the original Jewish menorah — from which the Hanukkah lights draw their inspiration.) Some of the commentators suggest that Ben Beivai was so good at his job that he could calibrate the length of a particular wick to match the length of the night for which it was prepared.

Wick making may not seem like a terribly glamorous job; the following story sheds some light on what we can learn from its inclusion on the list:

Rabbi Yosei came to the town of Kufra and wanted to appoint community leaders to care for the needs of the community and the provisions of the poor. However, those who were selected would not accept the appointment from him, because they deemed this job beneath their dignity.

⁦Rabbi Yosei said to them: Ben Beivai was responsible for the lowly function of the shreds of garments. If this man, who was appointed to deal with the wicks, merited to be listed with the greatest of that generation, you, who are appointed for life-sustaining matters, all the more so are you not honored by the position? You should therefore accept the request without hesitation.

But not everyone agrees that wick management was Ben Beivai’s job; he may have been braiding something very different. Yoma 23 (we’ll get there in about a month!) tells of a priest who cheated during the procedure through which work assignments were made in the Temple and was consequently punished with lashes administered by the person in charge of the paki’ah. In this case, it is clear that paki’ah, which as you may recall means “shreds,” means something like whip-master (because the whip was made of braided shreds of fabric).

If the existence of a Temple whip-master surprises you, it turns out that  there are other references to it in the Talmud. For example, Mishnah Middot 1:2 tells of an officer who used to go around checking on the priests who were on night watch. If the priests who were supposed to be on watch didn’t rise immediately and greet this officer, he would presume they sleeping on the job and immediately beat them. (If you’re still shocked, it helps to recall that corporal punishment on the job was common in the premodern world.)

So did Ben Beivai serve as wick-maker or master of the whip? While we cannot know for sure, one could argue that because the text from Shekalim, which is from the Jerusalem Talmud, is closer to the Temple in both place and time, it may be more likely to preserve a kernel of truth — making him a wick-maker. Yoma 23 reports that Abaye also  thought this was true, until he learned about the other tradition and changed his mind, adopting the position that Ben Beivai was in charge of lashing misbehaving priests. A reminder that the sages, too, were constantly sorting through received tradition to find clarity.

Read all of Shekalim 14 on Sefaria.

This piece originally appeared in a My Jewish Learning Daf Yomi email newsletter sent on April 4th, 2021. If you are interested in receiving the newsletter, sign up here.

The post Shekalim 14 appeared first on My Jewish Learning.

Rabbi Abbahu said: It is written: “And the families of scribes that dwelt at Jabez …” (I Chronicles 2:55). What is the meaning when the verse states the word “scribes”? Rather, it means that they crafted the halakhot of the Torah into numbered groups.

For the rabbis, the word sofer has a variety of meanings: one who counts, one who copies texts (scribe), scholar. The Talmud plays on all these different meanings in the following list of halakhot counted up by the scribes: 

Five categories of people may not separate terumah; five types of grain require the separation of challah; fifteen categories of women exempt their co-wives from levirate marriage and halitzah; thirty-six transgressions in the Torah carry karet as punishment; thirteen matters are stated relating to the carcass of a kosher bird; there are four primary categories of damages; and the number of primary categories of labor prohibited on Shabbat is forty-less-one. 

These examples are taken directly from mishnahs from different tractates and, in fact, except for the first two, each mishnah comes from a different seder (one of the six large orders of the Mishnah). Together, they represent the gamut of the Mishnah.

The rabbis next bring a different biblical verse to help illuminate the meaning of the word “scribe”:

Rabbi Eliezer said: It is written: “Now this is the copy of the letter that the king Artaxerxes gave to Ezra the priest and scribe, a scribe of the words of the mitzvot of the Lord, and of his statutes to Israel” (Ezra 7:11). Why does the verse state the word “scribe” twice? (The verse is not redundant) rather, it means that just as Ezra was a scholar in matters of Torah (the written law), so was he a scholar in matters of the sages (the oral law).

According to Rabbi Eliezer, Ezra — described twice in one verse as a scribe — was an expert both in Torah (“the written law”) and in rabbinic law, also known as “oral law” because it was originally passed down orally.

These two meanings of the word sofer — counter and scholar — seem to embody an inherent tension: counting is an apparently superficial act, while scholarship requires a deeper, more thorough understanding.

But maybe not. The depths of the Jewish people’s relationship with Torah is unquantifiable. In some sense, it is beyond words. Yet, as humans, our understanding of the world is mediated through words, including those we use to explain and even quantify the unquantifiable.

Revelation, the experience of Divine Presence, was recorded in words, because human limitation precludes any other way of recording such a profound event. Famously, the words of the Torah try to capture something of that transcendent experience with strange, synesthetic statements like “the people saw the thunder … and the blast of the shofar” (Exodus 20:15). Such descriptions push the limit of what words can communicate.

One way we can comprehend the vastness of Torah is by making lists, categorizing, summarizing. Yet, we hope that this potentially superficial understanding can lead to something deeper, more profound — just as the sofrim of Chronicles who made numerical lists are connected to the sofer, Ezra, who was a scholar of all of Torah. 

All of this connects to another list found on today’s page as well: a listing of exemplary rabbis. This list culminates in the quintessential Torah scholar, the one who was able to derive meaning from every tiny letter and even the decorative crowns of the letters in the Torah: Rabbi Akiva. For him, such tiny details were far from superficial, but the source of extraordinary creativity and deeper understanding. 

This tension between quantity and quality, summary and detail, breadth and depth, always exists in our Torah learning. This is especially true for those studying Daf Yomi. The trick is to balance, to utilize the superficial to get to something greater, something more meaningful. To be a sofer, in every sense of the word.

Read all of Shekalim 13 on Sefaria.

This piece originally appeared in a My Jewish Learning Daf Yomi email newsletter sent on April 3rd, 2021. If you are interested in receiving the newsletter, sign up here.

The post Shekalim 13 appeared first on My Jewish Learning.

One who dedicated his possessions to the Temple and there were amongst them things of the same kind as those that are used on the altar, for example, wines, oils and birds, Rabbi Eliezer says: they should be sold to those who need that kind of item (oto ha-min) and he should use the proceeds of the sale to fund burnt offerings, and the other possessions should go to the repair of the Temple.

In other words, if someone is offering extra items to the Temple, they don’t just sacrifice whatever he happens to have on hand, be it wine, oil or birds. Instead, he sells the wine to someone who needs to make a wine offering and the birds to someone who needs a bird for an offering — to someone who needs that particular kind of item. He uses the proceeds of the sale to purchase burnt offerings for the Temple. 

Today I’d like to focus on a specific word in this mishnah. The word min, meaning “kind” or “sort,” today refers to a comparable animal — same species and gender. Or, in the case of produce, the same kind of plant.

The Gemara introduces an important legal concept here, that recurs throughout the Talmud in different contexts. The phrases most commonly used are min b’mino (“from its own kind”) and min b’sh’eino mino (“not from its own kind”). It often shows up in matters of accidental food mixtures. When forbidden food is accidentally mixed with permitted food, the rabbis allowed one to annul the forbidden within the permitted and eat the mixture if there was a majority of the permitted — under certain circumstances (lots of fine print here!).

But the word min is also used in a very different context in the Gemara, to describe a sectarian — a person whose general religious orientation does not align with the rabbis. This usage probably dates to the late Second Temple period — roughly the first century of the Common Era (the Temple was destroyed in 70 C.E.). At that time, Judaism was famously fractured into a number of competing sects with starkly different ideologies. In this case, the word min (think of an expression like: “he’s a bad sort”) probably originally reflected the enmity between the Sadducees and the Pharisees and other Second Temple sects. After the destruction of the Temple, it was directed against those Jews who supported Rome and later to differentiate Jews from Christians. 

In fact, a special prayer was inserted into the daily Amidah asking for such people to have no authority. This tenth prayer is called “Birkat HaMinim.” It was often censored under Christianity and, as a result, different Jewish communities use other words, such as malshinim (slanderers) and mosrim (informers). Interestingly, the word apikoros, the more common word for a heretic, is not used. But clearly term min, to whomever it was applied, was not meant as a compliment.

Read all of Shekalim 12 on Sefaria.

This piece originally appeared in a My Jewish Learning Daf Yomi email newsletter sent on April 2nd, 2021. If you are interested in receiving the newsletter, sign up here.

The post Shekalim 12 appeared first on My Jewish Learning.

The rabbis of the Talmud said that the red heifer was initially brought to the Temple but was then actually slaughtered on the Mount of Olives, which overlooked the Temple Mount. But there is a concern: If the red heifer was led from the Temple Mount to the Mount of Olives through the bustling city of Jerusalem, there was a risk that the officiating priests or (God forbid!) the red heifer itself, might encounter something that made it ritually impure. Remember: this relatively rare animal was necessary to reverse corpse impurity (a serious and unavoidable condition) — one did not want to risk messing this up!

And so, the Mishnah tells us that a special ramp was constructed so that the animal and the priests could bypass the city entirely, maintaining their purity all the way to the site of the ritual on the Mount of Olives. But setting aside the mechanics of this all-important ritual, today’s daf asks a far more practical but no less important question: who paid for the ramp? 

Mishnah Shekalim 4:2 lists Temple items that were purchased from the communal funds. An initial view is that the ramp, like many other things we are reading about in this chapter, was constructed from communal funds. But the mishnah adds a dissenting opinion:

Abba Shaul says: The high priests construct the ramp for the red heifer from their own funds.

But why? The Gemara adds some amoraic commentary:

Rabbi Hanina said: There was great haughtiness among the high priests, as they would spend more than sixty talents of gold on it. This expenditure was unnecessary, as the previous ramp of the heifer was still standing. But not one of the high priests would take out his heifer on his fellow’s ramp. Rather, he would demolish it and build a new one from his own funds.

You may recall that the rabbis were ambivalent about the priesthood during the Second Temple period, which was in many cases more than a little corrupt. Or, as in this case, self-aggrandizing. According to Rabbi Hanina, each of the high priests insisted on building his own ramp for the red heifer just so he could show off his wealth and further cement his already lofty status. (As if a high priest needs to prove anything!)

Rabbi Ulla then raises a problem with Rabbi Hanina’s interpretation: 

Wasn’t it taught that Simeon the Righteous performed the rites of two red heifers, and the ramp on which he took out this one he did not use again to take out that other one?

Although many high priests were corrupt and despised by the rabbis, Simeon the Righteous was, as his name suggests, actually a great one — even according to the rabbis. He helped restore the Temple and direct the Jewish people toward correct worship and a closer relationship with God. He gave us one of the most famous teachings in a rabbinic collection of greatest-hit teachings: Upon three things the world depends: Torah, service, and acts of kindness. (Pirke Avot 1:2) And according to the rabbis, during Simeon the Righteous’s tenure, many miracles were performed for Israel — including the discovery of not one but indeed two red heifers. 

As Rabbi Ulla points out, Simeon the Righteous constructed new ramps for each of these red heifers. While we might be inclined to interpret each new high priest building their own ramp as some kind of status symbol, this interpretation can’t explain the behavior of Simeon the Righteous  — who never would have done it for that reason. Rabbi Ulla thus offers a different explanation: that the ramps were constructed because of the importance and grandeur not of the high priest, but of the ceremony itself.

Interestingly, the later commentators make this whole debate moot. As the 15th century commentator Ovadiah of Bartenura notes in his commentary of the Mishnah: “the halakhah does not follow Abba Shaul.” The ramp, like so many other aspects of Temple service, is constructed from public funds.

Read all of Shekalim 11 on Sefaria.

This piece originally appeared in a My Jewish Learning Daf Yomi email newsletter sent on April 1st, 2021. If you are interested in receiving the newsletter, sign up here.

The post Shekalim 11 appeared first on My Jewish Learning.

Not so fast! It seems that, for the rabbis, at least one kind of volunteering may cause a halakhic problem. The context is the Mishnah’s discussion of the people who guard wild grains that grew during the shmita (sabbatical) year. During the sabbatical year, the land is allowed to rest: intentional cultivation is forbidden, and people are expected to eat from their stores and from that which grows wild. In these years, some people were designated to guard wild grains which were then used for some of the grain offerings — the omer and the two loaves offered on Shavuot — in the Temple. Today’s daf records a dispute between the rabbis and Rabbi Yosei about these guardians of the grain. Must the guards be compensated? Or can they volunteer to guard the grain out of their love of mitzvot and desire to contribute to Jewish life?

They collect their wages from the collection of the Temple treasury chamber. Rabbi Yosei says: One who so desires may even volunteer his services and guard the grain as an unpaid bailee.

If volunteering is good, then what could possibly be the problem with Rabbi Yosei’s position? The rabbis explain that these grain offerings must come from the communal pot. By volunteering uncompensated, the guard may be seen as taking some individual responsibility and ownership over the grain — effectively getting in the way of it being an entirely communal offering. 

The idea of communal offerings is that every individual is already involved. After all, the communal offerings are brought of the collective sum of every individual’s half shekel contribution. Everyone donates the same amount, everyone’s contribution is equal. A volunteer grain guard could upset this balance. 

Over the course of today’s discussion, a series of Amoraim (rabbis who lived after the Mishnah was closed) refine the dispute between the rabbis and Rabbi Yosei. They conclude that individuals may donate some items that facilitate or enable a collective sacrifice with no problem. So, for example, donating wood for the altar or priestly clothing would be OK. According to these Amoraim, where the rabbis and Rabbi Yosei disagree is in the case of one who is donating the actual item to be offered in the Temple — such as an individual animal or sheaf of grain. Further, the rabbis seem to think that the guardian of the grain may actually take ownership over the grain if he is not hired to do so as part of Temple labor. If the grain becomes his, then when it is eventually offered at the Temple, it will have come from an individual and not the collective. Rabbi Yosei seems to think that so long as the individual then offers it to be offered as part of the communal pot, that’s fine. But the rabbis are concerned that the guard has effectively spoiled the communal nature of that offering.

Today’s daf doesn’t resolve the question as it relates to the offerings themselves. But in debating the issue, the daf calls attention to the tension between the individual and the collective, and the unforeseen consequences of volunteering to contribute to the communal pot. 

Read all of Shekalim 10 on Sefaria.

This piece originally appeared in a My Jewish Learning Daf Yomi email newsletter sent on March 31st, 2021. If you are interested in receiving the newsletter, sign up here.

The post Shekalim 10 appeared first on My Jewish Learning.

This quote from today’s daf is repeated in the Mishnah, the Babylonian Talmud, and the Jerusalem Talmud. It lists the steps required to become a genuinely religious and moral human being — a path, perhaps we might say, to perfection. The actual meaning of each step has been argued about for generations and still is. All translations are subjective; this one is mine.

The rabbi who gives us this road map, Rabbi Pinchas ben Yair, was a second-century Tanna (a rabbi from the generations that authored the Mishnah) and, according to Shabbat 33b, the son-in-law of the great mystic Rabbi Shimon Bar Yohai. (According to the Zohar, he was his father-in-law.) He was regarded as the epitome of the holy man. His holiness leant him marvelous powers. For instance, in a few pages we will see that he miraculously saves a girl who had drowned and the Talmud records several cases in which he parts waters like Moses.

Rabbi Pinchas ben Yair’s holiness is also expressed in being very particular about adhering to the letter as well as the spirit of the law — particularly when it comes to financial obligation. In a few pages’ time, we will see that he was so particular about not eating anything that was not properly tithed (i.e. the Temple taxes on that item had not been set aside) that when his donkey was stolen, it refused to eat the un-tithed food its captors offered it. Eventually, they turned it free because it was on track to starve to death and be of no use to them.

Rabbi Pinchas ben Yair’s terse prescription for spiritual perfection raises many questions. What do we mean by Separation? Holy Spirit? Resurrection? Why does it all culminate in the prophet Elijah who will herald the Messiah, rather than the Messiah himself? All of it needs clarification — but none is offered in the Gemara. The teaching is likely purposefully difficult; not meant for the masses but for esoteric mystics. 

Pinchas ben Yair knew full well that most people would never be able to reach this level of spiritual perfection — indeed, perhaps none. And many of us would not be able to understand most of these steps. But in laying out this path, he invites us to strive ever higher, to emulate these spiritual ideals and constantly try to up our religious game. Because none of us is above improvement — except perhaps Elijah.

Read all of Shekalim 9 on Sefaria.

This piece originally appeared in a My Jewish Learning Daf Yomi email newsletter sent on March 30th, 2021. If you are interested in receiving the newsletter, sign up here.

The post Shekalim 9 appeared first on My Jewish Learning.

On today’s page, the rabbis are concerned that the priest who removes the funds is above suspicion. Specifically, he must not be dressed in loose clothing lest people suspect he has discretely slipped a few coins into a pocket or up his sleeve. Here is the mishnah:

Those dispersing the funds should not enter the chamber wearing either a decorated cloak, shoes, sandals, tefillin or an amulet. Perhaps he will one day become poor, and people will say that it is because of the sin of stealing from the chamber that he became poor. Or perhaps he will become rich, and people will say that he became rich from stealing the funds of the chamber.

The decorated cloak (also sometimes translated “cuffed garment”) as well as the tefillin (worn in boxes) and amulet (usually housed in a leather pouch) all might provide a hiding spot for a few pilfered coins. The Gemara later suggests that even a curly-haired priest should not perform the ritual of retrieving Temple shekels because people might suspect him of hiding them in his tresses.

The mishnah seems less concerned that the priest will actually steal sacred funds than with the notion that his appearance will make people suspicious that he is stealing. And once people get that idea in their heads, they will find evidence for it. Whether the priest subsequently becomes rich or poor, they will say it is because he stole — either he is benefiting from those coins, or he is suffering divine punishment for his crime!

This idea that it is important to appear upright is reiterated in the Gemara on the top of tomorrow’s page where the rabbis offer scriptural proof:

Rabbi Shmuel Bar Nahman in the name of Rabbi Yohanan said that we see this principle from the Torah, the Prophets and the Writings (the three major sections of the Hebrew Bible) that a person should always be careful to be above suspicion (literally: to be clean in the eyes of God and human beings).

From the Torah: And you shall be guiltless before the Lord and before Israel. (Numbers 32:22)

Fom Joshua: You should be loyal to God and Israel. (Joshua 22:22)

From Proverbs: And you should find favor and approval in the eyes of God and human beings. (Proverbs 3:4)

Rabbi Gamliel Zuga asked Rabbi Yossi bar Rabbi Bun: Which of these (proofs) is the most compelling?

He replied: You shall be clean in the eyes of God and human beings.

Who was Gamliel Zuga? He doesn’t appear in the Babylonian Talmud and in the Jerusalem Talmud he is usually seen asking questions of more prominent sages, as he is here.

There were four very famous Rabbi Gamliel’s, all from the princely dynasty of Rabbi Yehuda HaNasi. But this one is not famous and his relation to the others is not clear. Perhaps, though, there is a clue in his name. “Zug ” means “pair.” Maybe this Gamliel was so-called because he overlapped with another Gamliel. Or perhaps he was named after his grandfather or was one of twins. Whatever the case, if he was anything like the other more famous scholars who bear the same name, he had to deal with the Roman authorities and was therefore much more aware of the outside world than many of his contemporaries. This is likely why he gravitated toward the more universal quote, the one that says it is important to not only behave well but be above suspicion not only before God, but before all people (not just Israel) as well.

Read all of Shekalim 8 on Sefaria.

This piece originally appeared in a My Jewish Learning Daf Yomi email newsletter sent on March 29th, 2021. If you are interested in receiving the newsletter, sign up here.

The post Shekalim 8 appeared first on My Jewish Learning.

This practice is seen on every page of the Talmud, but not often explained. Today, it is. 

⁦Rabbi Yohanan was walking while leaning on the shoulder of Rabbi Hiyya bar Abba, and Rabbi Eliezer was watching him and hiding from him. 

Rabbi Yohanan said: This Babylonian (Rabbi Eliezer) has done two improper things to me. One, he didn’t inquire after my welfare; and another, he is hiding from me, as though he doesn’t want to speak with me… And, that Babylonian did something else wrong, in that he did not say a halakhah in my name.

The first two affronts — hiding and failing to inquire after Rabbi Yohanan’s welfare — fall into the category of social faux pas and can be explained by cultural differences. (Remember, we are now in the land of Israel — this is not the Babylonian Talmud!) Rabbi Yohanan’s students try to appease their teacher by explaining that Rabbi Eliezer’s behavior is normal in Babylonia and he meant no offense.

The third affront, however, is more serious, as the Gemara explains by way of a midrash about Psalms 61:5:

I will dwell in Your tent forever… (Psalms 61:5)

Did David imagine that he would live and endure forever?

Rather, this is what David said before the Holy One, Blessed be He: Master of the Universe, may I merit that my words will be said in my name in synagogues and study halls, and through this I will attain perpetual life for myself.

In this verse, King David, the imagined author of most psalms, speaks of his eternal presence in God’s court. According to the midrash, David could not possibly have meant that he would literally live forever; rather, he asks God that his words, perhaps those of his psalms, would live forever — not in the heavenly court, but in the places where (the rabbis believed that) God is present: synagogues and study halls.

This notion, that David’s legacy will live on because his words are kept alive through prayer and study, echoes another idea on the page:

Rabban Shimon ben Gamliel says: One does not construct monuments for the graves of righteous people. The purpose of a monument is to remember the dead person, and Torah scholars do not need a monument, as their words of Torah that continue to be taught are their memorial.

Painters create paintings, carpenters build cabinets, architects design buildings. According to the rabbis, the legacy of these artisans is preserved through the artifacts that they create. Rabbis and teachers, however, are remembered through their words and wisdom — this is their monument. It imparts great power, since ideas can long outlast physical artifacts. But, as the rabbis well knew, that legacy also has a key vulnerability: when a student fails to attribute a teaching they can effectively write their teacher out of the tradition.

When Rabbi Eliezer failed to cite Rabbi Yohanan for his halakhah, this pained his colleague far more than being ignored on the street, whatever the cultural context. In the end, of course, their story was preserved in the Talmud (in more detail than was presented here), and perhaps by retelling it here, one more small step has been taken to preserve both their legacies for future generations.

Read all of Shekalim 7 on Sefaria.

This piece originally appeared in a My Jewish Learning Daf Yomi email newsletter sent on March 28th, 2021. If you are interested in receiving the newsletter, sign up here.

The post Shekalim 7 appeared first on My Jewish Learning.

The Torah also explains why. The half shekel was collected “in order that no plague come upon them...” (Exodus 30:12). As opposed to what we have been reading for the last few days, the Bible understands this not as taxation for road maintenance, but as a shield against future plague — that is, against divine wrath.

The Bible has an idea that counting people is dangerous. There is a narrative in 2 Samuel 24 that explicitly connects King David’s census of the fighting men to a plague sent by the Lord as a punishment. (I Chronicles 21:1 even puts the blame for David’s decision to count the Israelites on Satan!) In the Torah, the half shekel is a means of attenuating that danger.

On our daf today, we find alternative explanations for the half-shekel obligation, and though they also may amount to assuaging divine wrath, in this case the midrashim lean heavily on the description of the half shekel has “expiation money” (kesef kipurim) found in Exodus 13:16. That is, the half shekel atones for previous sins.

Several midrashim link the half-shekel tax to the sin of the Golden Calf, the moment when Moses went up Mount Sinai to receive God’s commandments and Israel, distraught without their leader, turned to idolatry:

Rabbi Yehudah and Rabbi Nehemaya.

One says: Since they sinned half the day let them give one shekel.

The other says: Since they sinned at six hours into the day, let them give half a shekel, which makes six garmesin.

Both of these explanations are based on a midrash in Shabbat 89a that calculates the timing of the sin of the Golden Calf at six hours into the daylight hours, or the midpoint of the day. The first position makes it simple: half a day’s worth of sin means a half-shekel of atonement money is required. The second position is based on a slightly more complex monetary calculation: six garmesin (one for each hour of sin) which equals half a shekel.

A third explanation, from Rabbi Yohanan ben Zakkai, also links the half-shekel to the sin of the Gold Calf, but the currency calculation is again different. In this case, Israel owes ten geirah, one for each of the Ten Commandments (and this, too, is the equivalent of half a shekel).

But the fourth and final suggestion links the half shekel obligation to a very different ancient sin: the sale of Joseph into slavery.

Rabbi Pinchas in the name of Rabbi Levi says: Because they (Joseph’s brothers) sold the first born of Rachel for twenty pieces of silver and each one of the brothers received a tabaah, therefore let each one give for his shekel obligation a tabaah.

Yet more ancient currency conversion! In the end each brother ended up with — you guessed it! — the equivalent of half a shekel. Israel repays that half shekel every year in atonement for this sin that involved the ancestors of the entire community.

Whether linked with the sin of the Golden Calf or the sale of Joseph into slavery, these midrashim render the half-shekel a symbol of communal responsibility, not just in the present, but in the past as well. Thus, what originally appeared a simple tax turns out to be a means of fulfilling one’s obligation not only to one’s present community, but also forging connection with the community that came before.

Like later generations in Israel, we personally neither worshipped the calf nor sold our brother into slavery (at least I hope you’ve never done those things!) but these crimes are part of our story, and as we give our half shekel, that is, when we give to contribute to the maintenance of our present community, we are meant to remember the ways in which those sins, and others too perhaps, remain an essential part of who we are, and who we wish to be.  

Read all of Shekalim 6 on Sefaria.

This piece originally appeared in a My Jewish Learning Daf Yomi email newsletter sent on March 27th, 2021. If you are interested in receiving the newsletter, sign up here.

The post Shekalim 6 appeared first on My Jewish Learning.

Given the physical weight of these coins and the logistical difficulty, the first mishnah of chapter 2 concedes that:

They may combine their shekels into darics because of the burden of the road.

Darics were Persian coins of gold and silver, and were worth substantially more than a half shekel. A messenger could thus carry a much smaller bag of coins on the road to Jerusalem. 

The Talmud then asks: why not exchange the half shekels for something even more precious than darics? After all, wouldn’t we want the messengers to carry the lightest possible burden on his travels? Later on in our daf, the Gemara is going to explore what happens if the messenger is robbed along the way — so clearly the rabbis know that someone carrying a large bag of money on the open road is a target for thieves. The Gemara asks:

Why not exchange (the half shekels) for pearls?!

The anonymous voice of the gemara rejects this possibility:

The value of pearls may decrease, and the Temple treasury of consecrated property will lose.

The Talmud is contrasting gold and silver coins, which it sees as having a fixed value, with other commodities whose value fluctuates based on supply, demand and other factors.

Does currency really hold a constant value?! Today, the United States economy has a system of fiat money, meaning currency’s value is not tied to a particular object but to a standard set by the government, society as a whole, or some other collective body. But today’s daf reminds us that not all economies have had this same system. Many ancient economies were based on a system like the gold standard, in which a fixed value associated with a precious metal undergirded the monetary system. 

The Talmud is worried that tying the half shekel value to something other than gold or silver could lead it to depreciate. And if that happened, a distant Jewish community’s contribution to the Temple in pearls would be worth less than it had intended (or, more to the point, than it owed!). This disparity meant that the Temple officials’ annual revenue would be smaller than they had foreseen, and could cause a real financial challenge to the maintenance of the Temple and the sacrificial service. 

Given this concern, why not just insist that the half shekel could only be donated as a half shekel? Why start messing around with exchanges at all? Today’s daf strikes a balance between these ancient economic realities and a recognition of the needs of the actual people who were charged with collecting and transporting the half shekel payments. 

Read all of Shekalim 5 on Sefaria.

This piece originally appeared in a My Jewish Learning Daf Yomi email newsletter sent on March 26th, 2021. If you are interested in receiving the newsletter, sign up here.

The post Shekalim 5 appeared first on My Jewish Learning.

Here, we find a disagreement between Rabbi Yohanan and Rabbi Shimon ben Lakish, a famous pair of rabbis who delighted in Talmudic wrestling. The question of the day is: Can a gentile or a Samaritan contribute a half-shekel to the building and maintenance of the Temple?

A quick explanation: The Samaritans were a group that broke with the Jewish community about 500 years before the Common Era. They have a Pentateuch that is substantially similar to the Torah, but do not have the books of the prophets or the writings that form the other two thirds of the Jewish Bible. By the rabbinic period, the Samaritans had many substantially similar practices to Jews, but were not considered Jewish and the relationship between these two groups was uneasy.

Now, you may wonder why the Talmud would even ask if Samaritans and gentiles can contribute to the maintenance of the Temple. Isn’t everyone who is willing to help advance a project welcome always, especially if they are willing to contribute money? Historically speaking, and even today, this question is fraught. Economic interdependence does not always feel like a good idea. Economic independence can ensure a certain degree of control over the project (the leaders did not want others to make decisions about Temple policy) and it can also simply feel good to pay for a project for yourself — granting the satisfaction of not needing to rely on others. In this case, these concerns may be at play in the considerations of the construction and maintenance of the Temple that should serve the people who worship there in an exclusive covenant with their God.

Rabbi Yohanan begins by stating that initially, during the construction of the Temple, neither a specific article (i.e., any item meant to be left intact), nor a nonspecific article (e.g., silver or a material that is melted down and incorporated into the structure but is not distinct), is accepted from gentiles or Samaritans. Subsequently, once the construction has been completed, a nonspecific article can be accepted from them, but a specific article is not.  

Rabbi Shimon ben Lakish replies with a more severe position:

Whether it is initially, during the construction of the Temple, or subsequently, neither a specific article nor a nonspecific article is accepted from them. 

Essentially, Resh Lakish believed that everything having to do with the Temple should be built for Israelites, by Israelites. 

A heated, and scripturally-grounded argument ensues. Maybe donations can be accepted for more limited purposes or on a more limited basis? Maybe they can be accepted if they are the subject of a vow taken by a non-Jew? Maybe if the funds are for the sake of sacrifices that non-Jews are allowed to bring in the Temple? Maybe non-Jews cannot contribute funds, but they can bring libations? Or maybe the non-Jew can contribute to the general Temple fund “for the sake of Heaven” but not the specific building fund?

This whole discussion concludes ultimately with Rabbi Shimon ben Lakish citing a clear directive from Tanakh (the Hebrew Bible) that:

The Temple construction was restricted exclusively to Jews as the book of Ezra states (concerning the Samaritans): You have nothing to do with us to build a house for our God, but we ourselves together will build for the Lord. (Ezra 4:3)

Pounding a nail into this coffin, Rabbi Hizkiya states that even the aqueduct which brought water to Jerusalem and the walls of the city and its towers may not be financed with non-Jewish money. The items of the Temple, and even its peripheral structures, should be built for Israelites and by Israelites. 

As we saw on the previous pages, the rabbis required the participation of all Israelites (through the collection of shekels), but on today’s daf, they limit participation in Temple funds to those who are not completely invested in the Israelite covenant with God. 

Read all of Shekalim 4 on Sefaria.

This piece originally appeared in a My Jewish Learning Daf Yomi email newsletter sent on March 25th, 2021. If you are interested in receiving the newsletter, sign up here.

The post Shekalim 4 appeared first on My Jewish Learning.

In every city and every town where main roads are closed due to construction, inclement weather, flooding, or just plain old traffic, movement grinds to a halt— impeding the flow of people and resources. Roads make possible the free flow of the lifeblood of societies. No wonder we call them “arteries.” In fact, the location in Jerusalem’s Old City where the main 7th century roads cross is called the “Cardo,” intentionally referencing the heart.

An ancient road dating back 2,000 years was recently excavated in Jerusalem. It starts at the Pool of Siloam, which may have been a large mikveh, and leads up to the Temple Mount. It allowed religious pilgrims to ascend to the Temple Mount at any time but especially on the three pilgrimage festivals of Passover, Shavuot and Sukkot.

In yesterday’s mishnah, we learned that the half shekel tax collected in the late winter month of Adar was used to finance public projects, including these kinds of roads. The reason is that they were often damaged over the winter, so early spring was a perfect time for repair. It was also when cisterns, (large pits used to store water), were repaired and, as we learn in today’s Gemara, reopened:

(Early spring) is a time when they remove the locks that were placed over the water cisterns during the winter, as this water was for public use in the summer, and they do not replace them until the winter.

Assuring the flow of water through cisterns, and goods across working roads, was an essential service of the public administration. These funds were also used to ensure the proceedings of courts, consecrate goods, perform rituals dealing with the rite of the sotah (the trial of the suspected adulteress), and facilitate other business that needed to be concluded prior to the end of the calendar year. 

All of this sheds light on ancient Israelite society. For one, we notice that the new year cited here is the first of Nisan, which is not the first of Tishrei (the new year we mark today). That means that Adar was the last month of the year, not Elul. In a few months in Tractate Rosh Hashanah, we will learn that there are actually four new years — meaning four dates at which various yearly cycles begin anew. According to the Torah, the first of Nisan was the month that was incredibly significant as it was the month that inaugurates spring and the festival of Passover — and it also marked the ancient tax deadline.

Second, we realize that the authorities in Jerusalem were not only religious authorities, but they were civil authorities, too, with all of the power that comes with that role. If they deemed it right, they could padlock access to public water, haul suspected adulteresses in for questioning, or even order taxes to be collected by force, if necessary. Concerning this, we read: 

On the 15th of Adar money changers would sit at tables set up throughout the country (to collect the shekels). On the 25th of Adar, they sat in the Temple. From the time when the money changers sat in the Temple, the court began to seize collateral (from those who had not paid their share).

Reading this, it is easy to see why the money changers and administrators were not the most popular members of society in antiquity. But, at the end of the day, the responsibility of the workings of critical infrastructure rested on their shoulders. They were responsible for the smooth functioning of society, including the roads. 

Read all of Shekalim 3 on Sefaria.

This piece originally appeared in a My Jewish Learning Daf Yomi email newsletter sent on March 24th, 2021. If you are interested in receiving the newsletter, sign up here.

The post Shekalim 3 appeared first on My Jewish Learning.