Thank you very much for the wonderful series. Unfortunately, this is the only thing I got stuck on in the series, and I’m not managing to understand well the prohibition derived from a positive commandment.

With a regular positive commandment, if you fulfill it then you have fulfilled a positive commandment, and if you do not fulfill it then you have the transgression of neglecting a positive commandment. With an optional positive commandment, if you fulfill it then you have a positive commandment, and if not, then nothing happened. With a prohibition derived from a positive commandment (a positive prohibition), then if you do not fulfill it you have the transgression of neglecting a positive commandment, and if you do fulfill it, nothing happened.

Forgive me, honored Rabbi. I hope I merit to ask more challenging questions; I just really can’t understand this. If you would agree to try one more explanation, I’d be very grateful. I can’t find any pattern by which I can understand all the examples you gave in the article and that I saw online….

Positive commandment — be in a certain state (positively: in X, or negatively: not in X)

Prohibition — do not be in a certain state (positively: in X, or negatively: not in X)

Prohibition derived from a positive commandment — be in a certain state because, even though it is neutral, it enables you not to neglect a positive commandment?

Positive commandment derived from a prohibition (is there really such a thing?) — do not be in a certain state because, even though it is neutral, it enables you not to violate a prohibition?

I explained it there at length. I don’t understand what the difficulty is. If you are in a negative state, then you have a transgression. But the transgression is not a prohibition; rather, it is simply not being in the other (the “positive”) state. For example, if you trade in Sabbatical-year produce, that is forbidden. But the prohibition is not the trading; it is that you did not eat them.

Thank you very much, honored Rabbi. I’ll keep looking into it. Unfortunately, I still haven’t understood…

I don’t understand how this differs from a regular positive commandment: it is forbidden to be in a state where you are not fulfilling a positive commandment, not because the state itself is a sin, but because you neglected a positive commandment (for example, tefillin, blessings, tzitzit, and so on).

There is no difference at all. On the contrary, it is exactly the same thing. That is why it is called a positive commandment (a prohibition derived from a positive commandment is a positive commandment). The difference is in the case where you did obey. With a regular positive commandment, you have a commandment; with a prohibition derived from a positive commandment, you do not have a commandment.

I understand… but that brings me back to my pattern question. Basically, how would this be written and how can it be identified, if we speak in terms of the pattern you defined for positive commandments and prohibitions:

Positive commandment — be in a certain state (positively: in X, or negatively: not in X)

Prohibition — do not be in a certain state (positively: in X, or negatively: not in X)

These patterns let me identify, relatively easily I hope, positive commandments and prohibitions, but I can’t manage to fit the prohibition derived from a positive commandment into a pattern.

I don’t think there is a special linguistic pattern for it. It is written like a regular positive commandment, and the Sages interpreted that here it is speaking about a prohibition derived from a positive commandment. For example, “To a foreigner you may lend at interest” — in its plain sense this is interpreted as a prohibition derived from a positive commandment (Maimonides’ approach here may perhaps be different): “Only to a foreigner may you lend at interest.” Conceptually this sounds very reasonable here, but not because of a linguistic pattern; rather because of the context and the reasoning.

Thank you very, very much.