Miketz (5765)

From the book Mida Tova: Articles on the Hermeneutical Principles by Rabbi Michael Avraham. Translated from Hebrew using gpt-5.4 (reasoning_effort=high, batch API).

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With God’s help

Midah Tovah — Eve of Shabbat, Parashat Miketz 5766

Questions

1. Why is gezerah shavah (verbal analogy) a hermeneutical principle of drash (interpretive exposition)?
2. How many types of gezerah shavah are there?
3. Is a lexical interpretation learned from gezerah shavah necessarily valid throughout the entire Bible?
4. What is the connection between the types of gezerah shavah and the division of the hermeneutical principles in the baraita of Rabbi Ishmael and that of Rabbi Eliezer son of Rabbi Yose the Galilean?
5. Are there halakhot (laws of Jewish law) that are learned through derashot yet are still regarded as plain-sense laws?

The Principle

Gezerah Shavah: let the obscure be learned from the explicit.

A. Summary of Last Year’s Article

“And Jacob did not send Benjamin, Joseph’s brother … and the sons of Israel came to buy among those who came.” And from where do we know ten? Rabbi Abba and Rabbi Isi said in the name of Rabbi Yohanan: Here it says “congregation,” and there it says, “How long shall I bear with this evil congregation?” (Numbers 14:27). Just as the congregation mentioned there is ten, so too the congregation mentioned here is ten. Rabbi Simon said: Here it says “among,” and there it says “among.” Just as the “among” said there is ten, so too the “among” said here is ten. Rabbi Yose said: If you derive it from “among those who came,” it could mean any number. Rather, here it says “the sons of Israel,” and there it says “the sons of Israel.” Just as here it is ten, so too there it is ten. Rabbi Simon said in the name of Rabbi Yehoshua ben Levi in the name of Rabbi: A minor may be counted as an adjunct to make up ten…

— Genesis Rabbah, Theodor-Albeck edition, 91:3

Samuel taught: The sanctification of the new month is only with ten. Rabbi Ba came; Rabbi Yasa said in the name of Rabbi Yohanan: Here it says “congregation,” and there it says, “How long shall I bear with this evil congregation?” Just as the congregation said there is ten, so too here it is ten. Rabbi Simon said: Here it says “among,” and there it says, “and the sons of Israel came to buy among those who came.” Just as the “among” said there is ten, so too here it is ten. Rabbi Yose bar Rabbi Bun said to him: If you derive it from “among,” there are many of them. Rather, here it says “the sons of Israel,” and there it says “the sons of Israel.” Just as there it is ten, so too here it is ten. And in cases involving land valuation: nine and a priest…

— Jerusalem Talmud, Megillah 4:4; Sanhedrin 1:4

In last year’s article we dealt with the relationship between several halakhic contexts in which a gathering of ten people is required: the composition of courts for certain purposes, a quorum for matters of sanctity, Grace after Meals, the public responsive recitation of the Shema, the definition of a public setting for the laws of sanctifying God’s name, and so forth. The passages quoted above contain derashot that teach the need for ten people in these various contexts, and the relationships among them.

We tried to trace the process by which these derashot took shape within the Sages’ own literature. We began by noting that although it is accepted that one may not derive a gezerah shavah on one’s own, there are nevertheless not a few creative dimensions in derashot in general, and in gezerah shavah in particular. See the page from last week on the meaning and importance of supportive derashot.

We then proposed a method for identifying and distinguishing, within various derivations, between the creative components and the components received by tradition. We noted that clusters of derashot on the same topic can give us clues in this regard. For example, if in all the derashot in a given cluster the halakha is clear and only the source is disputed, then it is reasonable to conclude that the halakha was received by tradition, whereas the derashah is the creative element generated at that point in the study hall. In addition, if all the interpreters use the principle of gezerah shavah, even though they do so from different source texts, it is reasonable to conclude that the very fact that the source of the law is some gezerah shavah was itself received by tradition.

We then applied this to the set of derivations cited above. We concluded from them that the law requiring ten in these halakhic contexts is a given, and therefore these midrashim are supportive midrashim that seek a source for it. In addition, one can see that all the masters of the midrash use gezerah shavah, and therefore it is likely that the fact that the source is some gezerah shavah was also received by tradition.

We suggested that in order to support the law that a “congregation” consists of ten people, the Sages began by looking in the Torah for contexts in which ten people appear. Two such contexts were identified: the spies, and Joseph’s brothers. The Sages then searched for key words that could be used to transfer this number to the other relevant contexts, such as matters of sanctity, and the like.

We saw that some of the gezerah shavah derivations the Sages used function like a dictionary that reveals the meanings of words by comparing two contexts. Such derivations can be called gilui milta — a disclosure or clarification of meaning. Another part of these gezerah shavah derivations are genuine gezerah shavah. Two of the derivations teach the meanings of the words “congregation” and “the sons of Israel,” and are therefore instances of gilui milta. By contrast, the derivation based on the word “among” appears to be a formal gezerah shavah. The reason is that the word “among” does not in itself indicate a quantity, and therefore this cannot be understood as a derivation that reveals a word’s meaning; one cannot say that the word “among” means ten people. In genuine gezerah shavah derivations, the similarity between the words does not reveal their meaning, but serves as a textual cue for transferring some law from one context to the other.

In the second part of the article we defined two components within every derashah: the formal-universal component and the content-particular component, a distinction that recurs in several of our essays. In the case at hand, the content concerns the characterization and definition of a collective. We asked there: what does a collective contain beyond the sum of the individual members included within it and composing it?

We brought several halakhic and Torah sources showing that the Torah’s approach is that a collective contains something beyond the individuals that compose it. We illustrated this with an example from the philosopher John Searle’s book Minds, Brains and Science, via the property of “liquidity,” which characterizes certain clusters of molecules, but never a single molecule. We saw that the subject of this property is the collective — the liquid — and not the individual units that compose it. We also saw that divine manifestation is what gives the community its unique standing, in the sense of “God stands in the congregation of God.”

This analysis raised an interesting possibility: to view the gezerah shavah from “among them,” which above we treated as a formal gezerah shavah, specifically as a gezerah shavah that touches on content. In this week’s article we will try to examine more closely the division between these two types of gezerah shavah.¹

B. Two Types of Gezerah Shavah

Introduction

The principle of gezerah shavah rests on a similarity between two words that appear in two biblical contexts. At first glance, this seems to be a kind of dictionary: from the meaning of a word in one context we can learn its meaning in the other, according to the rule, “let the obscure be learned from the explicit.” A clear example of this type of gezerah shavah is the derivation at the beginning of Babylonian Talmud, Kiddushin, cited in the article for Parashat Hayyei Sarah 5765: the repeated term “taking” from Ephron’s field, teaching that a woman is acquired with money just as a field is. This is a lexical interpretation of the term “taking.”

However, as we saw in last year’s article, there are gezerah shavah derivations that are very hard to fit into such a pattern. Moreover, lexical gezerah shavah looks like an interpretive tool of the plain sense. Many commentators use arguments from comparison even outside the formal framework of the hermeneutical midrashim. If so, it is not clear what makes gezerah shavah distinctive as a principle of drash.

Two Types of Gezerah Shavah

Ramban, in his glosses to the second root in Maimonides’ Sefer HaMitzvot, argues that the laws learned from gezerah shavah are biblical laws, contrary to Maimonides’ position. In the course of that discussion, under the opening words “And behold we have seen,” he writes:

Gezerah shavah is equal to the Torah itself — not only with regard to interpreting what is written in the Torah, but also to derive a novel matter not written in the Torah, such as one’s daughter born from rape and the other forbidden relations learned through it, such as the mother of one’s mother-in-law, the mother of one’s father-in-law, the daughter of his son’s daughter, and the daughter of his son’s son. And their statement, “Never let a gezerah shavah be light in your eyes,” teaches that they issue warnings on the basis of every gezerah shavah that they expound, and not only these are primary.

Ramban thus distinguishes between two types of gezerah shavah:

1. Gezerah shavah for the purpose of interpreting what is written in the Torah.
2. Gezerah shavah for deriving a novel matter not written in the Torah.

It seems that he intends the distinction we outlined above. Sometimes gezerah shavah serves as a tool for explaining the meaning of a word in an obscure context. We learn that the word’s meaning is the same as in the explicit context. But sometimes gezerah shavah does not interpret the literal meaning of a word; rather, it introduces a new law. In such a gezerah shavah we use the verbal similarity as the basis for transferring laws from the teaching passage to the passage being taught, but we are not engaged in interpreting biblical words.

Ramban’s wording implies that the lexical type — that is, a gezerah shavah like “taking-taking” — is the simple and familiar type. His point seems to be that there is also another kind of gezerah shavah: the substantive kind. Ramban himself gives an example of this second type: one’s daughter born from rape. He is referring to Babylonian Talmud, Keritot 5a:

Abaye said: Never let a gezerah shavah be light in your eyes, for the law of one’s daughter born from rape is one of the essentials of Torah, yet Scripture taught it only through gezerah shavah. For Rava said: Rabbi Yitzhak bar Avdimi said to me: The prohibition is derived from the repeated term henah-henah, and the penalty of burning is derived from the repeated term zimmah-zimmah.

Rashi there explains the details:

“One’s daughter born from rape is one of the essentials of Torah” — meaning, that she is punishable by burning. “It comes from henah-henah” — for with regard to one’s wife it is written, “You shall not uncover the nakedness of a woman and her daughter,” which implies her daughter by him and her daughter by another man; and at the end of that verse it says, “they are near kin; it is depravity.” And it is written, “the nakedness of your son’s daughter or your daughter’s daughter.” In the case of rape, it is this latter verse that is written, for the granddaughter from one’s wife is derived from the earlier verse, “the nakedness of a woman and her daughter.” But his own daughter is not written in the case of rape. Rather, it comes from henah-henah from the case of his wife: with regard to his wife it says, “they are near kin; they are depravity,” and with regard to the raped woman it says, “for they are your nakedness.” Just as there his daughter is written, as it says “a woman and her daughter,” so here too, in the case of rape, one makes his daughter like his daughter’s daughter. And if you say it is merely a kal va-homer — an a fortiori inference — we do not derive prohibitions from such reasoning. “Zimmah-zimmah for burning” — as it is written, “If a man takes a woman and her mother, it is depravity.”

Rabbi Yitzhak bar Avdimi’s gezerah shavah learns from the fact that a man’s daughter from his wife is forbidden to him that his daughter born from rape is likewise forbidden to him. This is not an interpretation of an obscure biblical word, for the derivation teaches us a new law not written explicitly in Scripture. We extend the prohibition of one’s daughter born from rape beyond one’s granddaughter born from rape, which is written explicitly. This is also Rashi’s language when he writes, “one makes his daughter like his daughter’s daughter”: we did not learn here what the words “his daughter” or “his daughter’s daughter” mean, but rather expanded the law to a new prohibition regarding his daughter.

It is reasonable that Ramban brings his example of this type of gezerah shavah specifically from here, because in this passage the Gemara explicitly states that the law learned from this gezerah shavah is a biblical law — and that is the point under discussion between Ramban and Maimonides in this gloss.

Further detail from the end of the sugya in Keritot appears in Babylonian Talmud, Sanhedrin 76a:

From where do we know the law of one’s daughter born from rape? But did not Abaye say: It follows by a kal va-homer: if one is punished for his daughter’s daughter, is it not all the more so for his daughter? But do we impose punishments on the basis of a kal va-homer? It is merely a gilui milta, a clarification. Rava said: Rabbi Yitzhak bar Avdimi said to me: It is derived from henah-henah; it is derived from zimmah-zimmah.

Here we see that gezerah shavah has greater force than a kal va-homer. A derivation from a kal va-homer is not sufficient to impose a death penalty for a forbidden sexual relation, whereas a derivation from this sort of gezerah shavah certainly is.

Gilui Milta: Let the Obscure Be Learned from the Explicit

We find in Babylonian Talmud, Bava Metzia 87b that the Sages wanted to derive the word “standing grain,” said with respect to a laborer’s right to eat while working (Deuteronomy 23:26), from “standing grain” said regarding the harvesting of the Omer (Deuteronomy 16:9). Just as the “standing grain” said regarding the Omer harvest is from produce obligated in hallah — the dough-offering obligation — so too the “standing grain” from which the laborer is permitted to eat, from the landowner’s field, must also be from produce obligated in hallah. In the Gemara’s conclusion this derivation is rejected, and from this it is clear that the Gemara did not think it had been received at Sinai. The commentators therefore ask: how could they even have tried to establish such a gezerah shavah if it was not received by tradition?

Ramban, in his novellae there, explains in his first answer that there was indeed a tradition that this gezerah shavah was from Sinai, but they did not know for what specific issue it was to be applied. He follows his own view, mentioned by us several times in the past, according to which, although one may not derive gezerah shavah independently, it is nevertheless not true that all gezerah shavah derivations were fully delivered from Sinai. Quite often the tradition is partial, and there remains a creative dimension even in gezerah shavah derivation.

Do the other medieval authorities disagree with this conception? That seems unlikely, since Ramban and the others bring several considerations supporting it. Beyond that, Ramban himself raises additional possibilities, which shows that he himself is not entirely satisfied with this option. In another approach he explains there that this is not gezerah shavah at all, but rather a binyan av — a derivation from a paradigm case — or a mah matzinu inference, and so too in Shittah Mekubbetzet there in the name of Raavad.

It seems that the root of the problem is that this explanation, although logically understandable, is somewhat forced in the simple reading of the sugya itself. We do not find there that, after the gezerah shavah is rejected with respect to produce obligated in hallah, the Gemara searches for some other halakhic implication of that same gezerah shavah. According to Ramban’s proposal, one would expect it to do so.

Ran and Ritva there explained that this is merely gilui milta, that is, lexical clarification. In their view, the Gemara is trying to determine the literal meaning of the word “standing grain” by means of the rule “let the obscure be learned from the explicit,” and not to expound a true gezerah shavah. From the position of these authorities it follows that a lexical clarification, gilui milta, is not gezerah shavah proper, and therefore requires no Sinaitic tradition.²

At first glance, this stands in opposition to the above-cited words of Ramban, for he had established that “let the obscure be learned from the explicit” is itself a type of gezerah shavah. Indeed, Ramban here does not choose this explanatory path. But the conclusion is not so simple. In several places the Gemara derives laws in precisely this sort of way, and yet treats them as gezerah shavah. How, then, can Ran and Ritva explain this phenomenon? To try to understand that, we will now examine several gezerah shavah derivations and try to characterize them in terms of the categories defined here.

Examples: Gezerah Shavah Derashot in the Babylonian Talmud

Let us survey several appearances of gezerah shavah derivations in the Babylonian Talmud. For the sake of simplicity, let us adopt the methodological assumption of Chernick, mentioned in the article for Parashat Hayyei Sarah, and choose only derivations that are explicitly identified as gezerah shavah. From our point of view, even if there are additional gezerah shavah cases — “not genuine” in his terminology, and “extensions” in ours — this is still a reasonable sample. We are looking for examples from the Babylonian Talmud, and not from one halakhic midrash or another, because we wish to deal with a text that does not belong specifically to one school, whether that of Rabbi Ishmael or that of Rabbi Akiva.

This survey yielded thirteen such derivations, two of them aggadic midrashim: Babylonian Talmud, Sotah 33b, and Babylonian Talmud, Niddah 22b.³ We will briefly examine the halakhic derivations in the Babylonian Talmud, to get a sense of the range of types included within them.⁴

1. Babylonian Talmud, Berakhot 35a

As it was taught: Rabbi says, here it says, “to add its produce for you,” and there it says, “the produce of the vineyard.” Just as there it means a vineyard, so too here it means a vineyard.

2. Babylonian Talmud, Shabbat 64a

“Garment and skin” is stated regarding a creeping thing, and “garment and skin” is stated regarding a corpse. Just as the “garment and skin” stated regarding a creeping thing impart impurity only if they are spun and woven, so too the “garment and skin” stated regarding a corpse impart impurity only if they are spun and woven.

3. Babylonian Talmud, Rosh Hashanah 2b

As Rav Pappa said: “twentieth year” and “twentieth year” form a gezerah shavah; here too “fortieth year” and “fortieth year” form a gezerah shavah. Just as there it is reckoned from the exodus from Egypt, so too here it is reckoned from the exodus from Egypt.

4. Babylonian Talmud, Yoma 81a

A punishment is stated with respect to affliction, and a punishment is stated with respect to labor. Just as with labor there is no punishment unless there was a prior prohibition, so too with affliction there is no punishment unless there was a prior prohibition.

5. Babylonian Talmud, Sukkah 43b

Here it says, “you shall dwell,” and regarding the inauguration rites it says, “you shall dwell.” Just as there it means days and even nights, so too here it means days and even nights.

6. Babylonian Talmud, Moed Katan 4a

He derives “Sabbath-Sabbath” from the Sabbath of Creation. Just as there only the day itself is prohibited, while before and after are permitted, so too here only the day itself is prohibited, while before and after are permitted.

7. Babylonian Talmud, Yevamot 24a

Here it says, “shall succeed to the name of his brother,” and there it says, “they shall be called by the name of their brothers in their inheritance.” Just as the “name” stated there concerns inheritance, so too the “name” stated here concerns inheritance.

8. Babylonian Talmud, Nazir 48a

The word “his mother” is stated regarding a nazirite, and the word “his mother” is stated regarding the High Priest. Just as the “his mother” stated regarding a nazirite means that in death he does not become impure for them, but he does become impure for their lesions and bodily discharges, so too the “his mother” stated regarding the High Priest means that in death he does not become impure for them, but he does become impure for their lesions and bodily discharges.

9. Babylonian Talmud, Bava Kamma 6b

The word “field” is stated below and “field” is stated above. Just as the “field” stated above refers to the injured party, so too the “field” stated below refers to the injured party.

10. Babylonian Talmud, Bava Batra 120b

As it was taught: Here it says, “this is the thing,” and there it says, “this is the thing.” Just as there it concerns Aaron, his sons, and all Israel, so too here it concerns Aaron, his sons, and all Israel; and just as here it mentions the heads of the tribes, so too there it mentions the heads of the tribes.

11. Babylonian Talmud, Sanhedrin 54a

“They shall surely be put to death” — by stoning. You say by stoning, but perhaps it means one of the other death penalties stated in the Torah? Here it says, “their blood is upon them,” and regarding the necromancer and the sorcerer it says, “their blood is upon them.” Just as there it means stoning, so too here it means stoning.

Out of these eleven derivations, numbers 1, 3, 7, 9, and 11 are of the lexical type, “let the obscure be learned from the explicit.” Thus we see clearly that the Gemara itself treats these as gezerah shavah, despite the fact that they involve lexical learning. This seems, at first glance, to contradict the claim of Ran and Ritva cited above, according to which derivations of the type “let the obscure be learned from the explicit” are not genuine gezerah shavah. To explain their position, let us examine each of the derivations that are problematic from their perspective.

Two Types of Lexical Gezerah Shavah

With respect to derivation 7, the Gemara explicitly indicates that even after the derivation we do not treat it as a mere lexical disclosure, for the word “name” continues to be understood as “name,” not as “inheritance.” The gezerah shavah instructs us to depart from the plain meaning in the context of levirate marriage and to interpret the word “name” there as inheritance. So we see that the gezerah shavah is not truly lexical. On the other hand, it does reveal an interpretation — though not a literal one — of the biblical word under discussion in the passage of levirate marriage. In any event, it is certainly possible, for precisely this reason, to regard this as genuine gezerah shavah rather than mere lexical interpretation. It clarifies a halakha through the interpretation of a biblical word, but it does not function as a dictionary. As we explained, a dictionary operates on the level of peshat, the plain-sense reading, by finding a word’s meaning through verbal similarity. In the case of a dictionary, that interpretation would apply throughout the entire Bible. If it does not apply throughout the entire Bible, then we are no longer dealing with plain interpretation but with midrash, and therefore this is gezerah shavah.

With respect to derivation 11, the gezerah shavah is not necessarily lexical at all. We learn from the words “their blood is upon them” that in both cases the death penalty is stoning. This comparison can be understood not lexically but halakhically. According to this interpretation, the gezerah shavah does not transfer the meaning of the words “their blood is upon them”; rather, it uses the verbal similarity to transfer a law connected with those words. According to this proposal, the phrase “their blood is upon them” means some death penalty, not necessarily stoning. But the verbal similarity serves as the basis for transferring laws from one context to the other, namely that here the death penalties must be carried out by stoning. This is the sort of derivation that seems lexical on the surface, but is in fact halakhic gezerah shavah. It should be noted that in the halakhic midrashim there are many examples of this type, and it is important to understand that not every apparently lexical gezerah shavah really is such. Sometimes a gezerah shavah that looks lexical is actually halakhic gezerah shavah.

In light of this suggestion, derivation 1 can be understood similarly. At first glance, it teaches us the meaning of the word “produce,” namely that it means a vineyard. But it is entirely possible that the word “produce” applies to other crops as well — and in fact we know that it does, even in the Bible. The gezerah shavah therefore does not teach us the meaning of the word “produce,” but rather a law that pertains to the word in this context: here it refers specifically to produce of the type of a vineyard. This is like the previous case, where the subject was a particular death penalty of the type “stoning.”

The same is true of derivation 9. It is obviously not the case that the word “field” literally means specifically the injured party’s field. That is not a lexical interpretation, but rather a law that limits the scope of the word’s application in the contexts under discussion. The gezerah shavah teaches us that in our case the word “field” is not to be understood generally, but specifically as the injured party’s field.

After reflection, it seems that derivation 3 is similar as well. The Gemara there hesitates between two possibilities: whether the reckoning is counted from the exodus from Egypt or from the erection of the Tabernacle. Clearly, however, reckoning from the creation of the world could be expressed in the same linguistic form as reckoning from the exodus, and in this sense the gezerah shavah only limits the range of possibilities rather than fixing the meaning absolutely. In other words, it does not mean that every reckoning worded in this fashion is, in its lexical meaning, specifically from the exodus from Egypt; rather, these specific reckonings are. And the proof is from the sugya itself. The Gemara shows that in another verse containing the phrase “twenty years,” the reckoning is from the exodus from Egypt. Yet it is not satisfied with one source, for it brings an additional gezerah shavah, “twentieth year-twentieth year,” to prove that there too it is from the exodus from Egypt. If there were indeed a categorical rule that every reckoning in this language is from the exodus, there would be no need at all for a further gezerah shavah regarding the fortieth year, since Rav Pappa’s gezerah shavah would already have established it. The fact that the Gemara brings a separate gezerah shavah for each reckoning proves that this is not a lexical interpretation, which by definition should apply throughout the Bible.

A Proposed Explanation for the Distinction Between the Two Types of Lexical Derivations

The conclusion is that there are derivations that look like lexical gezerah shavah, but they do not teach us a dictionary meaning. Rather, they reveal some limitation of the dictionary meaning, specifically in the case under discussion. As a result of the derivation, our understanding of these words in their other appearances throughout Scripture does not change. According to Ran and Ritva, these are genuine gezerah shavah and not lexical interpretations. This is not the use of the method “let the obscure be learned from the explicit,” even though at first glance one might have thought so.

Why, in fact, are gezerah shavah derivations of this sort not considered lexical interpretations? And further: why is a lexical interpretation not gezerah shavah, whereas these apparently lexical gezerah shavah are considered genuine gezerah shavah?

When some exegetical consideration is regarded as gezerah shavah, that means that the conclusion arising from it belongs to the plane of drash. The plane of drash exists alongside the plane of peshat and is independent of it. Every verse has a plain-sense meaning and, at the same time, a meaning on the plane of drash. Even when the word through which the gezerah shavah is carried out is a superfluous word, that does not mean it lacks a plain-sense meaning. It does have such a meaning; it simply need not have been written, since the verse could have been formulated without it. Thus even in a gezerah shavah based on a superfluous word — a type with respect to which we have already pointed out the connection between the plane of peshat, where it is difficult to understand why the Torah wrote this word, and the plane of drash, where gezerah shavah is expounded from it — it is still correct to say that there are two interpretations: one plain-sense interpretation, which indeed is not perfectly economical because it contains an unnecessary word, and another, midrashic interpretation.

According to this, it is clear why Ritva and Ran maintain that lexical interpretations are not gezerah shavah. A lexical interpretation reveals what the written word itself means. Once we have found that intention, it is the interpretation of the word itself, and therefore it is the peshat of the verse. What we have done in such a case is plainly not gezerah shavah, because it does not belong to the plane of drash. No interpretation parallel to the peshat has been created; rather, the peshat itself has been clarified.

By contrast, in halakhic gezerah shavah the peshat remains in place. The gezerah shavah transfers halakhot, on the plane of drash, from one context to another, but this does not touch the plane of peshat in the slightest. The two planes operate in parallel. Therefore such a derivation belongs to the plane of drash, and it counts as genuine gezerah shavah.

What about the cases of gezerah shavah discussed above? As we saw, at first glance the derivation gives an interpretation to the words involved, but that is only an appearance. The plain-sense meaning of those words remains what it was before the derivation. The derivation instructs us to depart from the plain meaning and to interpret the word in this particular case in a specific and different way — usually by restricting the ordinary meaning.

The necessary conclusion is that despite the apparently lexical character of these gezerah shavah derivations, they do not function as a dictionary. Rather, they create a halakhic plane parallel to the plain-sense plane that follows from the ordinary lexical meaning of the words themselves. It is therefore no surprise that, according to Ran and Ritva, these derivations are nevertheless considered gezerah shavah.

The Connection to the Difference Between the Thirteen Principles of Rabbi Ishmael and the Thirty-Two Principles of Rabbi Eliezer son of Rabbi Yose the Galilean

We have already mentioned several times the fact that the baraita of Rabbi Ishmael counts only thirteen principles, whereas Rabbi Eliezer son of Rabbi Yose the Galilean counts thirty-two. In that context we cited the words of Rabbi Samson of Sens in Sefer Keritut, who explains why some of the thirty-two principles do not appear in Rabbi Ishmael’s baraita. Regarding some of them, he explains that this is because they are principles of aggadic drash. Regarding another group, which are plainly principles of halakhic drash, he explains that the halakha learned through them is considered as though written explicitly in the Torah.

In the past we explained his intention as follows: there are derivations that reveal the plain-sense meaning of the words — for example, derivations based on superfluous words, whose appearance in the verse has no plain-sense explanation — and then the law produced by them is considered a plain-sense law and not a midrashic one. Therefore such principles of interpretation are not counted as part of the system of hermeneutical principles outlined by Rabbi Ishmael.

This also explained why Maimonides, in the heading to the second root, refers only to the thirteen principles and to ribbui — the principle of textual inclusion — and not to any other principle of derivation. We explained this by saying that, in Maimonides’ view, only those principles belong to the plane of drash. The other principles of halakhic interpretation that do not appear in Rabbi Ishmael’s baraita belong to peshat and not to drash. Therefore, according to Maimonides in the second root, which determines that the legal status of laws learned from derashot is that of divrei soferim — rabbinic law — one should not include among them those principles that belong to the plain-sense level. According to Maimonides, the legal status of those laws is a function of their belonging to a plane different from peshat.

In the present article we encountered another example of a principle — or sub-principle — that is not considered a principle of drash because it is treated as though written explicitly in Scripture, that is, as a plain-sense interpretive tool: lexical gezerah shavah. The halakhic results of this principle would, according to Maimonides, be considered biblical laws, since they arise from the plain sense of the verses. On the other hand, according to Ritva and Ran, no tradition is needed in order to derive these “derashot,” since they are not considered gezerah shavah at all.

This also lets us answer the question raised above: why is gezerah shavah a tool of drash rather than a tool of plain-sense interpretation? The answer is that lexical gezerah shavah is indeed a plain-sense tool, but genuine gezerah shavah do not deal with biblical lexicography, and therefore they belong to the principles of drash.

Returning to the “Standing Grain-Standing Grain” Gezerah Shavah

What remains to be examined is why, according to Ritva and Ran, the gezerah shavah of “standing grain-standing grain” is exceptional. As noted, they explained that it is a lexical gezerah shavah and therefore does not require tradition, since it is not a real gezerah shavah. Could that derivation not also be interpreted in the way we interpreted the derivations discussed here? Why not say there as well that the derivation is only apparently lexical, whereas in fact it merely restricts the accepted meaning, and is therefore halakhic gezerah shavah?

Perhaps the reason is that, at least at the stage of the initial assumption in the sugya, when they wanted to derive that gezerah shavah, the word “standing grain” in the Bible really would have been interpreted literally as referring only to produce obligated in hallah. In other words, the sugya initially thought there was a genuine lexical interpretation here.

However, an examination of Bava Metzia 87b shows that at certain stages in the give-and-take of the sugya, the Gemara explicitly thought this was a non-lexical gezerah shavah, for it asks why one should assume that it refers specifically to “standing grain” subject to hallah, rather than any standing grain. If so, the Gemara is clearly aware, even after making the derivation, that the meaning of the word “standing grain” is broader.

It is possible that the Gemara refers there to ordinary language, in which the word “standing grain” is understood more broadly, and not specifically to the language of the Torah. That would require more detailed examination of the sugya there and of the biblical sources — very few of them — in which this word appears, but this is not the place.

To conclude, let us note that we also divided the derivations in last year’s article into lexical derivations and halakhic derivations. In the end, we saw that it is possible that all of them are lexical. In light of what we have said here, it is clear that the intention is not to a dictionary in the strict sense, but to the disclosure of the meanings of words, such as “congregation” or “among them,” in a way limited solely to the specific contexts under discussion. A consideration that sought to expose the dictionary meaning of those words would leave the category of gezerah shavah altogether.⁵

Footnotes