Time in Jewish Law 7
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Table of Contents
- A bill of divorce written for a specific woman, a future characteristic, and blind definition
- The truth-value of statements, knowledge, and selection that is not time reversal
- The distinction between retroactive selection and a condition, and the halakhic irony
- Eruvin: retroactive selection versus conditional wording
- No retroactive selection as a problem of legal effect on an undefined object
- Betrothal, contradiction between possibilities, and Rashi’s view of amorphous legal effect
- Terumah, ownership, and the priest’s benefit of choice
- A condition in commandments as an analogy to retroactive selection
- Gittin: contingent on one’s own will and contingent on the will of others
- Tosafot: selection in time, and the admission that in some cases even a condition needs retroactive selection
- Nachmanides: the difficulty posed by the ruling that at the Torah level there is no retroactive selection, and the resolutions
- Nachmanides on will, indeterminism, and Eruvin formulated as two conditions
- Summary of the positions of the medieval authorities (Rishonim) and the direction at the end of the passage
Summary
General overview
The text argues that one can write a bill of divorce “for her sake” even when the characterization of the woman is made by means of a future property that will only become clear tomorrow, because already today there is one defined woman who meets the criterion, even though nobody knows who she is. The text distinguishes between retroactive selection as a process of choosing one object from a group on the basis of a future characteristic, and a condition in which the legal effect applies to a defined object and depends on a future occurrence. It argues that the dispute “there is retroactive selection / there is no retroactive selection” need not be understood as backward influence in time. It then raises the puzzle of why a condition is agreed upon and works even though it is “causality from the future to the past,” whereas retroactive selection is disputed even though it seems simpler. Finally, it presents Rashi, Tosafot, and Nachmanides as different approaches to defining the boundary between a condition and retroactive selection, and to the question whether a condition depends on the will of the stipulator or on the will of others.
A bill of divorce written for a specific woman, a future characteristic, and blind definition
The text states that if a bill of divorce is written for the woman “who will go out tomorrow through the doorway first,” then already today there is one defined woman for whose sake the bill was written, even though no one knows who she is until tomorrow. The text compares this to writing a bill of divorce for “the older one” of two twins when no one knows who emerged first, and defines this as a bill written for her sake together with the ordinary laws of doubt, not as a fundamental problem. The text presents the possibility of writing a bill of divorce “for whichever one I will want,” and explains that according to the view that there is retroactive selection, it is enough that one woman was defined by a criterion—even if the criterion is “blind”—whereas “not for her sake” is a situation in which no woman was defined at all, not even by a blind definition. The text argues that assuming “for her sake” depends on the writer consciously knowing who the woman is empties the distinction of meaning, whereas understanding “for her sake” literally as “for the woman” allows the definition to be real even without human knowledge.
The truth-value of statements, knowledge, and selection that is not time reversal
The text argues that a future-tense statement such as “Leah will go out tomorrow through the doorway first” already today has a truth-value; it is simply impossible to know it. Therefore, definition on the basis of the future can already now be well-defined. The text rejects the claim that retroactive selection creates “a thing and its opposite” in the present, and states that only one statement is true today—the one that will occur tomorrow—even though a person does not know which one. The text concludes that the dispute about retroactive selection is not necessarily a question of “going back in time,” but rather whether a future criterion can serve as a sorting mechanism for one object out of a group in the present.
The distinction between retroactive selection and a condition, and the halakhic irony
The text defines retroactive selection as selecting one object from a group on the basis of a future characteristic, and defines a condition as a mechanism in which the legal effect on a defined object depends on the fulfillment or violation of a future condition. The text presents a condition as “from now onward, retroactively,” in which the future acts as a cause shaping the validity of the act done today, and states that precisely this mechanism is universally accepted as functioning. The text points out the irony that Jewish law accepts causal influence from the future to the past within the framework of a condition, while regarding retroactive selection—which is not reverse causality but sorting—there is a dispute whether it works.
Eruvin: retroactive selection versus conditional wording
The text brings the case in tractate Eruvin in which a person places two eruvs at twilight and stipulates that the eruv that will take effect is the one on the side to which the sage will come on the Sabbath. It states that the need is for the eruv to take effect at twilight, and therefore retroactive selection is required. The text suggests an alternative formulation as two separate conditions: the eastern eruv will be the eruv if the sage comes to the east, and the western eruv will be the eruv if he comes to the west; and it argues that at first glance this would “certainly work” as a condition, about which there is no dispute. The text states that the gap is not merely wording but mechanism, just as there are modes of acquisition that work and others that do not. Therefore the Jewish legal question is whether the act succeeds in generating the legal effect, not whether the result is “permitted” or considered a legal trick.
No retroactive selection as a problem of legal effect on an undefined object
The text formulates that according to the view that there is no retroactive selection, the problem is not time reversal, but the impossibility of imposing legal effect on an object that is not defined within the group at the time of the act. It compares this to cases like “two log” that are supposed to become terumah out of a hundred, where the identity of the two log is determined on the basis of future drinking, and argues that if the future does not clarify retroactively, then the legal effect is being asked to apply to “something amorphous” that is not a specific object. The text connects this to questions of partnership in tractate Nedarim, and to the idea that retroactive selection in a partnership means that the division of use over the axis of time clarifies “which part was mine” whenever one enters the jointly owned courtyard.
Betrothal, contradiction between possibilities, and Rashi’s view of amorphous legal effect
The text brings the “doubt-certain” case of betrothing one out of five women without defining which one, and argues that where there is no practical contradiction between the possibilities, one can view a “weak” legal effect as applying to all of them, whereas the sharper problem arises where Jewish law or reality requires an exclusive choice of one possibility. The text presents a difference between Eruvin, where two eruvs cannot both be valid for two directions, and betrothing one of five women, where in principle one could have betrothed all of them. The text states that according to Rashi, even according to the view that there is no retroactive selection, the legal effect can still take place even when the object is not defined; but the future will not clarify retroactively that it applied specifically to the object that turned out in the end, and the legal effect remains vague. The text compares this to a “quantum doubt,” to Schrödinger’s cat, and to the double-slit experiment, in which contradictory possibilities coexist in parallel in a weak way, not merely as a lack of knowledge.
Terumah, ownership, and the priest’s benefit of choice
The text states that after setting aside terumah, one can no longer “change one’s mind” and reverse the legal effect, because the produce has already left his domain and become the property of the tribe of priests, and the one who separated it has only the benefit of choosing to which priest to give it. The text compares this to monetary acquisition, where one cannot retract because the item already belongs to the buyer, and distinguishes between an acquisition that transfers ownership and an acquisition meant only to strengthen the matter, expressing firm intention and in principle allowing retraction from the commitment. The text argues that the tribe of priests can claim the terumah in religious court, even though no particular priest has a personal claim.
A condition in commandments as an analogy to retroactive selection
The text presents the dispute over making conditions in commandments as related to the possibility of acting in a formalistic way versus fulfilling a commandment as an act that requires conscious decision. It brings an example from the Avnei Nezer regarding afikoman after midnight: if the Jewish law follows Rabbi Eliezer, then eating before midnight is the afikoman; and if it follows Rabbi Akiva, then the eating at the end of the seder is the afikoman. The text argues that this structure resembles retroactive selection because it selects which eating will count as the commandment out of a group, and it presents a view according to which one cannot “do two acts and let the Holy One, blessed be He, choose” which one is the commandment, even though there are opinions that permit such formalism.
Gittin: contingent on one’s own will and contingent on the will of others
The text brings the Talmudic passage in tractate Gittin in which Rav Mesharshia challenges Rava concerning Rabbi Yehuda: “If it depends on his own will, he does not accept retroactive selection,” from the case of “one who buys wine from among the Kutim,” where Rabbi Yehuda and Rabbi Yosei and Rabbi Shimon forbid it; whereas “if it depends on the will of others, he does accept retroactive selection,” from the law of “what is meant by ‘in those days’” in the bill of divorce of a deathly ill man: “This is your bill of divorce from now if I die from this illness.” The text cites Rashi, who explains that although this looks like a condition, retroactive selection is needed because at the time the bill of divorce is given it is uncertain whether he will die; and the condition is fulfilled on its own and depends on one whose life and death are not in the hands of the one making the stipulation, and therefore “the matter is clarified” retroactively. The text notes that Rashi distinguishes between conditions “that are in his power to fulfill and that he intends to fulfill” and a condition that is not in his power or intention to fulfill, and from this he also links a single condition to the sugya of retroactive selection.
Tosafot: selection in time, and the admission that in some cases even a condition needs retroactive selection
The text brings Tosafot, who explain “from today” in the bill of divorce of a deathly ill man as a legal effect that begins “one hour before his death” rather than at the time of giving, and therefore the retroactive selection concerns choosing a moment out of a set of times that is not known in advance. The text cites Tosafot, who quote Rashi but add that according to this explanation “that hour in which the bill of divorce takes effect is not clarified and known, and retroactive selection is needed.” The text states that Tosafot concludes that “even in the case of a condition, retroactive selection is needed,” and brings proof from “I am having relations with you on condition that father will consent,” which in the sugyot is treated as retroactive selection.
Nachmanides: the difficulty posed by the ruling that at the Torah level there is no retroactive selection, and the resolutions
The text brings Nachmanides, who asks that if we accept Rashi, it follows that all bills of divorce of a deathly ill man, according to the view that does not accept retroactive selection, would not be valid bills of divorce; whereas Jewish law is that at the Torah level there is no retroactive selection, and nevertheless “when he dies it is a bill of divorce.” The text brings an alternative explanation that interprets “from today if I die” as “like today, when I die,” meaning one hour before death, so that the case belongs to retroactive selection of time rather than an ordinary condition, and in this way reduces the dependence of the law on retroactive selection. The text notes that Nachmanides still struggles with “on condition that father will consent,” because it appears to be a standard condition, and he asks why we should not say the same thing also about “on condition that you give me two hundred zuz,” which works according to all opinions. The text answers that a condition that is in the woman’s power is considered like a condition that is in his power, since both parties have committed themselves to the transaction; but in a condition handed over to the inner heart and will of another, we do not say “the matter was clarified” retroactively except according to the view that there is retroactive selection.
Nachmanides on will, indeterminism, and Eruvin formulated as two conditions
The text attributes to Nachmanides a rule according to which matters that depend on will and the inner heart belong to retroactive selection, because one cannot view the future will as clarifying retroactively the state of affairs at the time of the act. The text formulates a distinction whereby stipulating a natural event such as “if rain falls” can be an ordinary condition, but stipulating a human decision is a case where “the act may change, and his intention is not clear from the first moment.” The text applies this also to Eruvin, and presents that according to Nachmanides a formulation such as “if a sage comes to the east, my eruv is to the east, and if not, my eruv is void” works according to everyone only when the condition is built as an act on one object and not as a choice between two; whereas the structure “if a sage comes to the east, my eruv is to the east; to the west, my eruv is to the west” is retroactive selection and works only according to the view that there is retroactive selection.
Summary of the positions of the medieval authorities (Rishonim) and the direction at the end of the passage
The text concludes that one can see that Rashi, Tosafot, and Nachmanides all agree that retroactive selection certainly exists when one chooses one object from a group, and that there are cases in which even with respect to a single object there arises a dependence on retroactive selection, as emerges from the Talmudic discussion. The text formulates that Rashi explains this through the criterion of “in his power and in his intention to fulfill it” and firm intention, whereas Nachmanides insists on the basic distinction between retroactive selection and a condition and adds an exception for conditions dependent on will and on what is entrusted to the heart. The text suggests that ultimately the differences between the methods may be more a matter of “small definitions” than a fundamental dispute, because all of them are grappling with the fact that the Talmud attributes retroactive selection also to certain conditional situations.
Full Transcript
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] So basically I characterized that one woman out of the two by means of a property of hers that will be manifested tomorrow. But that characterization is one that can already be well-defined today. Nobody knows it, and nobody can know it either, but on the conceptual level there is one defined woman here for whose sake the bill of divorce was written. Tomorrow it will also become clear to us who it is. That’s not essentially different from a situation where, say, there is some property of a certain woman that nobody knows—maybe not even she herself. But I write a bill of divorce for, say, two twins. Okay? I write the bill for the one who came out second before her sister from the womb—the older one. Nobody knows, neither they of course nor anyone else, nobody knows which of the two came out first. Okay? But I am writing a bill of divorce for one very well-defined woman. That has nothing to do with retroactive selection. I’m writing a bill of divorce for the one who is older. True, nobody knows who the older one is, so we’ll be in doubt.
[Speaker C] But let’s ask ourselves for a second. What? Are you Yitzik? Doesn’t that completely empty out the definition of “for her sake”? I could write a bill of divorce for some woman in the world such that this one will be the woman, that this one will be that woman.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] When you say it empties it out, you’re assuming that “for her sake” means that I have to have in mind something that defines for me who the woman is. But if you understand “for her sake” to mean literally for the woman, then what do I have?
[Speaker C] Then just write a generic bill of divorce.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Say: for that woman who will be divorced by this bill of divorce.
[Speaker C] What? I’m writing a bill of divorce for that woman who will be divorced with—
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] —this bill of divorce, the one I’ll want to divorce. Same thing. For whichever one I will want. The Talmud says this. He wrote a bill of divorce for whichever one of them—
[Speaker C] —that I want, from the two that he has. Yes, that’s in the Talmud. But I’m asking more generally, can one write—? Obviously. A bill of divorce—so then what is the meaning of “for her sake”?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] We’ll write one bill, one standard bill of divorce. If I write a bill of divorce for that woman whom I will eventually choose to divorce with this bill of divorce, it doesn’t matter—all the women in the world, not specifically if I’m the husband—in principle, in principle, according to the view that there is retroactive selection, that’s fine. Because there’s a difference between not writing it for anyone, and writing it for the one who will eventually be divorced. If it wasn’t written for anyone, then it’s not for her sake.
[Speaker C] When the scribe writes—
[Speaker D] It has to be his wife, no problem.
[Speaker C] No, but I’m talking about the law of “for her sake.” I’ll write: when the scribe sits down and writes, I am writing a bill of divorce for whoever comes wanting to divorce his wife, and this bill will be for the sake of that woman he wants to divorce. No problem. On the conceptual level that’s perfectly fine.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Only if the husband’s instruction is required, then again there may be a problem here, because maybe you need the husband’s explicit instruction—that’s a dispute. But yes, on the conceptual level, according to the view that there is retroactive selection, it works. What is a bill of divorce not written for her sake, according to the view that there is retroactive selection? It’s a bill that wasn’t written even in this way. I just wrote it generically. That’s all. I didn’t define any woman, not even with a blind definition of this sort. I didn’t define any woman. But a blind definition—if in the end there is one specific woman here who meets those criteria—then it’s a bill written for her sake. Now true, if it never becomes clarified—say I write a bill for one of the two without even defining a mechanism that tells us who—then the question is whether that can be considered not for her sake at all. It may be considered for her sake, but as an essential doubt. What does it mean, a doubt that is never clarified? Or if I write the bill for the older of the two, as I described before. That’s easier. Because there really is one defined woman for whom I wrote the bill. It’s just that nobody knows who. Okay? So then the laws of doubt apply, fine. If you gave the bill to this one, there will be doubt whether the bill works or not. But those are just the ordinary laws of doubt; there is no conceptual problem here. If the problem is that retroactive selection doesn’t work, then this isn’t just a case of doubt—the bill wasn’t written for her sake at all. If you gave her the bill, she isn’t doubtfully divorced; she simply isn’t divorced at all. Okay? So therefore, the claim that there is retroactive selection can at this point be interpreted in a way that neutralizes, to a large extent, all the difficulties of the concept of retroactive selection. On the contrary, it makes the view that there is no retroactive selection the one that needs to give us explanations. The view that there is retroactive selection is straightforward. Just as I can define a woman by a certain characteristic of hers even if nobody knows it—true, I’ll be in doubt, but it still counts as for her sake, it was written for the woman—so what’s the problem? I can also write it for that woman who is defined on the basis of a future characteristic of hers. That too still defines one specific woman; nobody just knows who she is, so what happened? It’s simply a criterion that singles out one woman from a group of people. And therefore the one who says there is retroactive selection says: that too is a criterion, that too is a definition. It defines one woman from the group, and that’s perfectly fine, it can work. As long as it defines a woman. We spoke about truth-value, and when I say “Leah will go out tomorrow through the doorway first,” then already today, when I say “Leah will go out tomorrow through the doorway first,” that is a true statement, if tomorrow Leah will indeed go out first. It’s just that nobody can know that it’s a true statement. But the truth is that it is a true statement. So now, if I define the bill of divorce for the one who tomorrow will go out first through the doorway, then true, I’ve already defined it for Leah right now—it’s just that nobody knows it’s Leah, but that doesn’t matter. In principle there is a woman for whom this is defined. That is a very well-defined woman. So therefore the view that there is retroactive selection becomes a completely simple position if you look at it this way. And then it turns out that the dispute whether there is retroactive selection has nothing at all to do with the question of whether one can go backward in time. I’m not going backward in time at all. It has nothing to do with that question. I said that the root used here, meaning to “clarify” or “select,” is not from the sense of becoming clarified retroactively, but from the sense of selecting—like separating food from waste or waste from food. In other words, I am selecting one thing or one object from a group of objects. And that is the issue: if I select one object from a group of objects through some element that is defined on the basis of the future, the question is whether the characteristic has to exist now, or whether it can also be a future characteristic. But there is no question here of backward influence in time. By contrast, with a condition—and now I’ll bring in the example of a condition—we said that with a condition, according to Rabbi Shimon, it is “from now onward, retroactively”: in a condition, the future is a causal factor with respect to the past. Meaning, the fulfillment of the condition or the violation of the condition uproots or establishes the act today. So here there is causal influence from the future to the past. Now, ironically enough, causal influence is agreed upon by everyone. There is no dispute that a condition can work. And precisely this thing, which seems much simpler and is not causal influence, is what is disputed—whether there is or isn’t retroactive selection. Very strange. Usually we think the whole problem with retroactive selection is going backward in time, but what we’re actually discovering is the opposite: going backward in time—the Jewish law is indifferent to that, there’s no problem at all, do whatever you like. But when you perform the act that would seemingly be easier to do—selecting one element from a group on the basis of a future characteristic—there is a dispute whether that can be done or not.
[Speaker C] Isn’t it because right now it comes out as a thing and its opposite? Meaning that both the statement “Leah will go out through the door first” and “she won’t go out through the door first” are both true now? Why would that be?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Why? Only one of them is true. Whichever one will happen tomorrow is the one that is true today. Of course.
[Speaker C] But you—
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] —just don’t know. Only one statement is true today. That’s why I spoke about truth-value. Only one statement has the truth-value of true today. You don’t know which statement it is. Fine. But only one is true. And if it is true, then it is always true. So what exactly is the problem? And that brings us to the relation between retroactive selection and a condition—that’s the topic I want to deal with today. The relation between retroactive selection and a condition can be sharpened in the following way. Let’s take the case in tractate Eruvin. The Talmud speaks about someone who wants to go hear a lecture, and the sage might come either to the east or to the west. He places two eruvs at twilight and says that the eruv that will take effect is the eruv on the side to which the sage comes. Since the eruv has to take effect at twilight, we need the question of retroactive selection here, because the sage will only arrive on the Sabbath, and the question is whether that can cause the eruv to take effect at twilight. An eruv cannot take effect in the middle of the Sabbath. So here there is a question whether there is or isn’t retroactive selection. But I could have done exactly the same thing in the form of conditions. For example, I place an eruv on the east side and I say: this eruv will be an eruv if a sage comes—
[Speaker B] —to this side—
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] —and if not, then it won’t be an eruv. Now I take another eruv, put it on the west side, and say the same thing. This eruv will be an eruv if the sage comes to this side, and if not, then not. Okay? That would certainly work. There’s no problem with it at all. Right? All I did was an act with a condition. There’s no dispute that an act with a condition can work. I made two eruvs with conditions. So if that’s so, then why, when I do the two conditions together, does it not work? What difference does it make? Is it just a matter of wording? After all, I can perform it by a somewhat different Jewish legal technique, or with different phrasing. So if Jewish law has no problem with such a thing, then why, when I do it in the form of retroactive selection and not in the form of two conditions, is there a problem?
[Speaker E] Isn’t there also a problem in that form—that it’s a future condition?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No. Every condition is future.
[Speaker E] What do you mean? Because I know that in Jewish law it’s forbidden to make a condition regarding a future act, like with the Shema—if I say, if I—
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, that’s making a condition with regard to commandments. A condition regarding commandments is something else. There there are big disputes; not everyone agrees it’s forbidden. There are major disputes about that. But I’m speaking about conditions in transactions, not commandments. So basically the question is: yes, if you’re not willing to accept a Jewish legal act of this kind, then what difference does it make whether I phrase it this way or another way? If I had phrased it as two conditions, it would have worked. So why, if I phrase it as retroactive selection, does it not work? What is this? It’s the same thing. All I’m doing is saying more briefly what I could have done at greater length with two acts and two conditions. So why does it work here and not there? Or here there is a dispute and there it’s agreed? Here you have to pay close attention. In principle it’s not just a matter of wording. It’s a matter of mechanism. One mechanism can do this job and another can’t. It’s like saying: suppose I perform some act of acquisition in order to transfer an object to you. There are modes of acquisition that won’t work, and there are modes that will. For example, money does not acquire movable property. Okay, by Torah law money does acquire, but that’s the dispute between Rabbi Yohanan and Reish Lakish—but let’s say according to the opinion that money does not acquire by Torah law. Fine? If I want, I can transfer it to you by pulling it. So what difference does it make? I just did it another way. If the Torah doesn’t want to let me transfer ownership, clearly that’s not the point. It isn’t that the Torah doesn’t want to let me transfer ownership. It says this mode does not succeed in transferring ownership. There are ways in which you can do the job. It’s not that I have a problem with the result of that job. Let the result be whatever you want, as long as you do it in a way that is actually effective. If you do it in a way that isn’t effective, then it doesn’t work—not because the Torah disapproves of the result, but because that thing doesn’t manage to do the job. And here too, that’s the point. The Torah doesn’t have a problem with the result—that you make two eruvs on two sides and somehow later choose one of them, as though you’re tricking the Torah. As though you’re not really acquiring the eruv at twilight but pulling some kind of trick, some sort of legal loophole. That’s not the point. The issue isn’t legal trickery. The Torah has no problem with that. The issue is simply whether it works or not. And it’s not Torah law here anyway—it’s rabbinic; Eruvin is rabbinic. Doesn’t matter. The question is whether it works or not. It’s not a question of whether this result is acceptable from the standpoint of Jewish law. Jewish law has no issue with the result. The question is whether the action succeeds in producing it. What is the difference? That’s the point. The difference is—and here I return to the question with which I began—that going backward in time seems more problematic, and yet precisely about that there is agreement. That’s a condition. Whereas retroactive selection, which does not involve causal backward movement in time, is precisely what is disputed, even though that would seem to be the simpler case. Because there is a difference. And this is the simple difference between retroactive selection and a condition—although it seems not all the medieval authorities agree. The simple difference is this: the problem in retroactive selection is not going backward in time. The problem in retroactive selection—and incidentally this is somewhat related to making conditions in commandments; there are those who understand the problem there in this way too—the problem in retroactive selection is that you want to impose a legal effect on an undefined entity. You cannot impose legal effect on an object that is not defined among the different objects. In other words, according to the one who says there is retroactive selection, of course you can impose it and there’s no problem. So from his perspective the problem doesn’t exist. How then can he agree that a condition works? Because here too I agree. Fine. Maybe it’s even all the more so from my perspective. A condition is harder for me to swallow, but the Torah says—there is the section on vows and the section on Gad and the sons of Reuben—so the Torah says it works. All the more so that retroactive selection should work too. So according to the one who says there is retroactive selection, there’s no difficulty at all. The difficulty is for the one who says there is no retroactive selection. Because he will agree that a condition works. In a condition there is reverse causality in time. So that you agree works—but retroactive selection, which is simple, that you don’t agree works? Obviously. Because if I say there is no retroactive selection, what am I really saying? That you cannot characterize one object out of a group by means of a future property. That’s not backward influence in time. So what happens now? You’re trying to impose legal effect on an undefined, unclarified object. You cannot impose legal effect on an undefined object. In a condition, the object is one object. When you take this eruv and say “this eruv”—yes. No, but assuming that future clarification is not considered clarifying, then at the moment when you do the act, the thing is not clarified.
[Speaker D] But your assumption was that it is clarified—
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] According to the view that there is retroactive selection. But according to the view that there is no retroactive selection, it is not clarified. Fine—so what’s the problem? The problem is that once the object is not clarified, what is the legal effect supposed to rest on? You can’t impose legal effect on two abstract log—say, on the two log that are to be terumah. What, any two—? It’s like, I don’t know, that famous joke about the Meshekh Chokhmah—I think he said it about the Rogatchover; there were rabbis in the same city—so the Meshekh Chokhmah said about the Rogatchover that he—well, same thing here. Meaning, there is no such thing as the half of the Talmud that you want. In other words, you can’t impose legal effect on two log when you haven’t defined which two log it is to apply to. And the assumption of the view that there is no retroactive selection is that these are not specific two log. You can’t define two log on the basis of a future property. So since that’s the case, the problem isn’t going backward in time. The problem is that one cannot impose legal effect on an undefined object. That’s the point.
[Speaker F] What about a tree, half of which belongs to a Jew and half to a gentile? There the question is whether retroactive selection applies. No one imposed anything there.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Which retroactive-selection question is that? That’s “this and that together cause it.” Why is that retroactive selection? I don’t remember.
[Speaker F] Maybe half a field, I think.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Maybe where they are partners—the retroactive selection of partners? Because it’s retroactive selection in a partnership, not because it’s Jew and gentile. Like two brothers—brothers who divided property, are they buyers or heirs, according to the view that there is no retroactive selection? Partnership clarifies retroactively which half was mine. It has nothing to do with Jew and gentile; that’s just how partnership is defined. That’s the dispute at the beginning of the fifth chapter of tractate Nedarim about Rabbi Elazar ben Yaakov there, with someone entering his fellow’s courtyard—partners who vowed not to derive benefit from one another. Can I enter our jointly owned courtyard or not? If there is retroactive selection, then every time I enter the courtyard I’m entering my own courtyard, because retroactive selection means that when I enter, the courtyard belongs to me. The division is spread over the axis of time, or the section where I’m standing at that moment is mine. That’s if there is retroactive selection, and if there is no retroactive selection, then not. So basically the question is how you define a partnership.
[Speaker G] The case where half is in the Land of Israel and half outside the Land is also connected to retroactive selection.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] That’s “this and that together cause it,” not retroactive selection as far as I remember. Where is there a sugya that makes it depend on retroactive selection? The whole question there is “this and that together cause it.” So basically, the problem in retroactive selection, more than in a condition, is that in retroactive selection the issue is not going backward in time; it is the issue of imposing legal effect on an undefined object. I mentioned that Rabbi Shimon on the question of doubtful certainty, remember? That if I betroth one out of five women without defining which one, then according to this view of no retroactive selection, in principle in such a case there is no betrothal.
[Speaker C] Why in a condition is there no problem of legal effect? Because it’s one object.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] In a condition, when I make a condition, it is always on one object. That is the difference between a condition and retroactive selection. The difference between a condition and retroactive selection is that in a condition it is clear which woman I am divorcing. The only question depends on a future event—whether I divorce her or do not divorce her—not whether I divorce
[Speaker C] her or divorce the other one. Meaning, it’s not the need to choose one woman from two women. Because the eruv isn’t an eruv when you make a condition, right? I’m making a condition on one eruv—
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] One eruv—either it is an eruv or it is not an eruv, not either this one is the eruv or that one is. When I say either this or that, that’s retroactive selection. When I say this one is this, but either it is an eruv or not, that’s a condition. So I can impose legal effect when the object is defined, even if the legal effect is conditional. But if I’m imposing legal effect on an undefined object, how can I impose it? Now, why do we know that if a person betroths one out of five women, there certainly is betrothal? There is doubt—and I said doubtful certainty, never mind. The whole problem arises only when he betroths one out of two sisters, because then his betrothal is handed over to intercourse, since each one is in doubt the sister of his wife. So that’s the problem. But with two ordinary women you can betroth. Why does it work there? The answer is that there you are not betrothing one out of the two in the sense of one clarified one out of the two. You can betroth one that is not clarified. There is no contradiction. With the two log, say, or in the eruv case—you can’t make an eruv in two directions. An eruv cannot be both east and west. So by definition you have to select here one of the directions. Therefore both cannot be valid. According to the view that there is no retroactive selection, both cannot be eruvs—not even weak eruvs mixed together somehow. But if you betroth one out of five women—what, I could in principle have betrothed all five, couldn’t I? I could have betrothed all five. So what’s the problem? Then I betroth one out of the five and betroth each of the five with a weak betrothal, one-fifth of a betrothal. So what’s the problem? Why shouldn’t I be able to do that? Therefore here there is no problem of legal effect that has to apply to an undefined object. It applies to all of them. Where there is a contradiction between the possibilities, then you need the legal effect to apply to only one of them—but that one is not defined, so what are you going to do? But Rashi says that even in such a situation the legal effect does take place. Right? Rashi says that if, according to the view that there is no retroactive selection, there are still two log of terumah here. The legal effect takes place even according to that view. Meaning that Rashi holds that according to the view that there is no retroactive selection, one can impose legal effect on an undefined object. So then what is nevertheless the problem in saying there is no retroactive selection? That the object remains undefined. Right? According to the one who says there is retroactive selection, you impose legal effect on an object that right now we don’t know who it is, but in the future it will become clear that that was the object. According to the one who says there is no retroactive selection, the legal effect again does take place, but the future will not clarify retroactively that from the start it had already applied to what would later become clear. Rather, it applies to something amorphous. Okay? And that can be done. Fine, that is Rashi’s view.
[Speaker C] Meaning, to something amorphous?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] It applies to one loaf out of five, or to two log out of a hundred. But even when in the end there remain two specific log at the end of the process, those won’t be the ones. You cannot determine that those were the ones from the beginning. Rather, it applies to two log—to any two log that could potentially remain at the end. That is one possibility. This is basically a kind of doubt, yes—like Schrödinger’s cat, like the slits. I spoke about it last time. So this is basically a quantum doubt. You can say that the particle passed through each of the two slits, though obviously it would seem to have passed through one, and if it passed through one it didn’t pass through the other. The answer is no: it passed through one and through the other in a weak way. Half of it, let’s call it that. There are different formulations that depend on the interpretations, but half of it passed through slit A and half through slit B. There are no literal halves—it’s a hypothetical half. But those are two possibilities. I live with two contradictory possibilities in parallel. Now how can that be expressed? According to the one who says there is no retroactive selection, not according to Rashi’s view—that can’t be. According to the one who says there is no retroactive selection, yes according to Rashi’s view, it can be. But even after you see the film, it won’t reveal retroactively that it passed through this slit. Okay? And according to the one who says there is retroactive selection, it also reveals retroactively that it passed through this slit from the outset—it passed only through this slit, you just didn’t know it. Right? In quantum theory, for example, there are huge disputes about this. Today the accepted interpretation in quantum theory is that it is not a lack of information; it is a real doubt, an ambiguity in reality itself. In reality itself, the particle passed through slit A and slit B. Not that it passed through one of them and I just don’t know which.
[Speaker I] Okay. Why does the detector show it goes through only one?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Because the detector changes something—the detector affects the physics, it doesn’t just reveal something to me. It’s not passive. Right. Okay, so basically here we are assuming that the difference between a condition and retroactive selection is the question of how many objects you are addressing. A condition is when your focus is on one object. You say: if the condition is fulfilled, I impose the legal effect on it, and if not, then not. But it is always one object; you don’t need to choose one out of a group. Okay? By contrast, if I choose one object out of a group, that is retroactive selection, not a condition, and then there is a dispute. Fine—that is the definition I have proposed so far.
[Speaker J] So if we discover some “first doorway” case, then according to Rashi both of them would also remain undefined? Both of them would remain undefined?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Why are you saying that there is retroactive selection? What do you mean?
[Speaker J] If there is no retroactive selection.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] If there is no retroactive selection, then no—according to Rashi it comes out that each one is doubtfully divorced. If you give the bill of divorce to both of them, then apparently both of them will be divorced—not that both of them will be divorced, but the one that—no, actually you don’t need to give it. Wait a second: I’m writing the bill, not giving the bill. I write the bill for the one who will go out first through the doorway, okay? Now the bill is written for one of them. Yes, you would actually need to give it to both. Then I wait until tomorrow. Tomorrow Leah goes out first through the doorway. Now I give the bill of divorce. If I give the bill to Leah, she will be doubtfully divorced, or weakly divorced—doubtfully divorced—even according to the view that there is no retroactive selection. Right? If I give it both to Leah and to Rachel, then again both of them will be doubtfully divorced or weakly divorced. But not only Leah, even though now I already know that Leah went out first through the doorway, because a future event has no ability to clarify that this was the object for whose sake the bill was originally written. But it is still true that it was written for one of them.
[Speaker C] So it’s either yes or no—what’s certain is maybe.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Okay, so that is the difference, the simple verbal difference, between a condition and retroactive selection. You just need to notice that there are some complications here. Not in every case of retroactive selection is there really a contradiction between the possibilities. In Eruvin, for example, there cannot be an eruv to both sides; the Jewish law doesn’t allow it. Either eastward or westward. So there you really must select one object out of two. But to divorce, for example, both women—I can divorce both women. There is no contradiction between whether I divorced this one or divorced that one. But the Jewish law says that if you wrote it for her sake, then it isn’t for her sake—meaning the contradiction is created because of the—
[Speaker C] You’ve got one bill of divorce in your hand.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Yes, you have one bill of divorce that was written for one woman. If it was written for this one, then it wasn’t written for that one. So the contradiction is really created by reality, not because Jewish law doesn’t allow writing a bill of divorce for two women. Okay? What about the jugs of wine? Again, with the jugs of wine there’s an even easier problem; that’s already a third level. Because with the jugs of wine I could have designated all one hundred logs of wine. Basically, according to Jewish law, you know, you can’t designate the whole pile as terumah; something has to be left over. You can designate as much terumah as you want—there’s no limit, it doesn’t have to be specifically one-fortieth, one-fiftieth, or one-sixtieth—but one grain of wheat has to remain that is not terumah. Meaning, you have to fix something that remains outside, and that’s the law. So it’s true that with the logs too, say I want two logs out of the hundred to be terumah, then in principle I couldn’t make all of them terumah; I’d have to leave something. But if not for that law—say, setting that aside—the law of retroactive clarification would not depend on that.
[Speaker C] That’s a constitutive law, right?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Yes, meaning, right.
[Speaker C] Meaning, if you don’t leave something, according to now—
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Then you have nothing left. Terumah has to fix something. If it doesn’t fix something, it isn’t terumah. You can’t designate terumah unless it fixes something else, even though those are two different laws. Designating terumah is a priestly gift—you give it to a kohen—and besides that it also fixes the tevel, turning it into ordinary produce. Here you see that it’s not totally disconnected. Meaning, this thing becomes a priestly gift only if it fixed something. Without fixing something, it isn’t a priestly gift. The reverse, by the way, is not true. You can fail to give it to the kohen and people can still eat. You’ll be a transgressor for not giving it to the kohen, but giving it to the kohen is not a condition for the produce being fixed. Okay? Nowadays.
[Speaker B] What? Nowadays. Yes, now, nowadays exactly.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Yes, so regarding the logs, for example—what’s the problem there really? After all, I could have imposed terumah status on all the logs, so why should I care if there’s a faint terumah status on every two logs out of the hundred? Here there’s no problem like with an eruv. With an eruv, the eruv has to be either to the east or to the west; it can’t be both. So I’m trapped, because I can’t apply the eruv to one of them and it can’t apply to both together. But with terumah—two logs of terumah out of a hundred—what’s the problem? After all, I could also have made all one hundred terumah. Let’s ignore for a moment that law that something has to remain to be fixed. I don’t think that’s why they say there is no retroactive clarification. Fine? So in this case, in principle, what’s the problem? Why shouldn’t there be retroactive clarification here according to everyone?
[Speaker K] He won’t be able to drink it? What? He won’t be able to drink it?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Right—as terumah, for the kohen, for example. That everything should be terumah, like according to the one who says there is no retroactive clarification in the standard understanding. Okay? So why indeed can’t you apply it? First of all, really you can—yes indeed—that’s what Rashi says: that two undefined logs are terumah. Maybe in other places Rashi wouldn’t say that, and then it’s a novelty. In not every sugya about retroactive clarification will Rashi say that there is one thing, just not defined. For example, with eruv—think about it—according to Rashi, one of the eruvs takes effect, even according to the one who says there is no retroactive clarification. Eruv is rabbinic, so in rabbinic matters we rule that there is retroactive clarification, but say according to the one who says there is no retroactive clarification, fine? One of the eruvs certainly takes effect. Now I’m in doubt, and a rabbinic-level doubt is ruled leniently. So why can’t I do it? Even according to the one who says there is no retroactive clarification, I should have been able to go there. Fine—not a doubt whether there is or isn’t retroactive clarification, but according to the one who says there is no retroactive clarification, I am in doubt according to Rashi, right? So why not? Maybe because there too Rashi would agree that the one who says there is no retroactive clarification doesn’t mean that one of the eruvs takes effect and we just don’t know which. That’s not like the wine logs. Because with the wine logs there’s no contradiction; you can say that all of them have some faint applicability. But with eruv you can’t say such a thing, because if it applies to the east it doesn’t apply to the west. There the contradiction is from the standpoint of the law. You could say that with the logs too it doesn’t work, because you decided it’s only two. So you determined that all one hundred cannot become terumah—not the law. With eruv, the law says you can’t make an eruv in two directions. Here, you decided. Fine, but that’s what you did. You are responsible for what will be terumah and what won’t; that’s in your authority. So if you decided that it will be only two logs, then you yourself said you can’t do it. I find that hard, because I said they’re two undefined logs, so what’s the problem? That’s what I said—what do you want? If you define it as all one hundred logs in a faint way, that’s what I said, and what’s the problem with that happening? So to me this is a bit difficult, but I haven’t found anyone who makes such a distinction in Rashi’s view between the different places. I don’t know—maybe you can, maybe you can’t.
[Speaker B] By the way, I just wanted to ask: say he designated those two logs, and now drank the hundred, and now he changes his mind and says, wait, why do I need this complication with the two and whatever will remain for me at the end? Fine, I’ll designate all of it now. I’ll designate all of it now from the existing hundred from today. Let them drink all of it—what is this? All one hundred will be forbidden, all one hundred will have the status of terumah. A kohen could drink it. What?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] First, a kohen could drink it. But second, it still wouldn’t work, because once this is terumah, you can’t cancel it.
[Speaker B] No, he would ask concerning the doubt.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No—how can he cancel terumah? What do you mean? Once there is terumah, you can ask for annulment. One can seek annulment for terumah like for a vow.
[Speaker B] But you can’t—
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] But you can’t cancel the terumah. You don’t cancel it. Once you designated terumah, that’s it—now it’s terumah. It belongs to the kohen. You can’t suddenly say, “I regret it, it’s not the kohen’s.” It’s already his property, finished. Like if I sold you—this is an interesting point people don’t notice. If I sold you a certain item, okay? I performed an act of acquisition. Now I regret it. Why can’t I retract? Because I performed an acquisition? Because I committed myself not to retract? No, of course not. It’s yours. You can’t regret it and now decide about something that is yours that it should be mine. The problem is not the commitment—whether the act of acquisition forbids me from retracting or doesn’t allow me to retract—that’s not the point. I have no connection to the object, just like I can’t steal it. What do you mean? It’s not because I committed myself to something and the acquisition obligates that; it’s simply because there’s no such thing. Not “there’s no retroactive clarification” in that sense, but there’s just no such thing, right? In an acquisition used merely to reinforce a matter—that’s the difference between a regular acquisition and an acquisition used to reinforce a matter. An acquisition used to reinforce a matter is when I lift a kerchief in order to say I’m appointing an agent, or making some contract, so I lift a kerchief or some object to strengthen the contract. That acquisition transfers nothing. It’s an acquisition that expresses firm intent to obligate oneself.
[Speaker E] Aren’t you transferring the kerchief?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, I’m not retracting from the kerchief; I’m retracting from the contract. I now want to retract from the contract. I lifted a kerchief and afterward I want to retract from the contract.
[Speaker E] Isn’t lifting like drawing movable property, which acquires it, sort of?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, you give it and you can also take it back; usually it’s acquired on condition of return. You take that back afterward. But I’m talking about the contract itself. The contract is acquired by lifting the pen. Fine? I’m not talking about barter exchange; I’m talking about symbolic acquisition with a kerchief. In symbolic acquisition, I make a contract, I appoint you as an agent. So let’s lift a pen—really you don’t need that in agency, you don’t need an act—but for the sake of the discussion, let’s do an act so that the agency takes effect. And from now on, you’re my agent. Now I regret it. I don’t want it. Or you regret it and don’t want to be my agent. In principle, you can do that. It’s not like a regular acquisition. The only reason you can’t is just because we made an acquisition. The acquisition forbids you to retract or doesn’t allow you to retract. But when transferring an object, the reason you can’t retract is not because we made an acquisition; the object is his. What does it mean to retract? What connection do you have to the object? I want to retract from your house, so that it won’t be yours. What does “retract” mean? The house is yours, not mine. You understand? People don’t get this—I’ve already seen objections on these points. It’s simply a misunderstanding. Okay, so with terumah too, I can’t retract from having designated terumah. Once it’s terumah, it’s terumah; it already belongs to the kohen, it’s no longer about me.
[Speaker B] But as you said earlier, there isn’t some specific kohen.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Fine—the tribe of the kohanim. It’s the tribe’s property. It belongs to the tribe of the kohanim. I only have the right of benefit: I can choose which kohen from the tribe receives it.
[Speaker B] Yes, but like you said earlier, there are two laws in designation. One is to separate the portion in order to permit the rest, and the second is that once you separated it, it’s already terumah.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Giving it to the kohen means physically giving it; it already belongs to him. At the moment of designation it already belongs to the tribe’s assets. Terumah is the tribe’s property. You have the right of benefit to determine which kohen gets it, but it already belongs to the tribe. Meaning, if you don’t give it, they can sue you in religious court. In religious court—not under religious coercion to perform commandments. The tribe of the kohanim can collectively hire a lawyer… because no specific kohen can, since it can go to this one and it can go to that one, meaning, anyone who comes I’ll say, “I’ll give it to someone else; you can’t sue me.” But if the whole tribe of kohanim organizes, hires Weinroth, okay, to sue me—for that one grain of wheat that exempts the heap—and he sues me over that grain and pays Weinroth a million dollars, and Weinroth now represents the whole tribe of kohanim in this matter—no problem, they can sue me. It’s their property. I have the right of benefit that I can determine which kohen to give it to. That, yes—the right of benefit is mine. Okay, so that’s basically the difference between retroactive clarification and a condition.
[Speaker H] Can you say, regarding a condition in commandments, how is that similar to retroactive clarification?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Also with a condition in commandments, the issue is—why do they argue about conditions in commandments? Because you can’t—either you perform a commandment or you don’t perform a commandment. You can’t perform a commandment in an indeterminate way. Like the condition of the Avnei Nezer, where you eat the afikoman after midnight. Meaning, if the law follows Rabbi Eliezer, then the matzah I ate earlier will be the afikoman, and if it follows Rabbi Akiva, then the matzah I eat at the end of the seder will be the afikoman. Fine? So essentially, this condition in commandments is saying: I’m performing a commandment contingently, in a formal way. When you perform a commandment, you have to know that you’re performing a commandment. You can’t do all kinds of tricks. A commandment is either done or not done; you can’t play games with the Holy One, blessed be He. Either you performed a commandment or you didn’t. So with a commandment, they see the condition as a kind of retroactive clarification. Because it basically says you both performed a commandment and didn’t perform a commandment, since the formal performance of a commandment that takes effect in some indeterminate way—or this act… either this act is eating matzah or this act is eating matzah. There’s no such thing. When you perform a commandment, you need to know you’re performing a commandment and perform it—not play games with the Holy One, blessed be He. You decide which commandment you want, choose whichever you want. I did two acts; You decide which one is the commandment. Fine—there are those who say yes. The question is whether that kind of formalism works in performing commandments. It’s a bit—I’m saying—it brings us back from condition to retroactive clarification. And a condition regarding commandments is basically, in the context of afikoman even more strongly, because in the context of afikoman I’m really conditioning with respect to two eatings. Is the eating before midnight—the last one before midnight—the afikoman, or is the last eating of the seder night after midnight the afikoman? And if so, then this really is selecting the afikoman from a group, selecting one object from a group, which is classic retroactive clarification. Okay, classic retroactive clarification. But of course I can do it with a double condition. This will be afikoman if such-and-such, and if not then it won’t be afikoman, and that one will be afikoman if not, and if yes then yes it will be afikoman. I can do it with a double condition. Okay, so in that sense it remains a condition, and still it won’t work. It won’t work because you can’t make conditions on the fulfillment of commandments. You can make conditions in business; can you make conditions on the fulfillment of commandments? Either you fulfill a commandment or you don’t fulfill a commandment; fulfilling a commandment is not a merely formal matter. Business is a formal matter; it can be a formal matter. Okay, now up to this point I explained the difference between a condition and retroactive clarification the way I always understood it, but Rashi writes differently. And there’s a handout page here; you can divide it. Some of the pages probably have something on the back too. On the difference between retroactive clarification and condition—it says on the other side. Wait, there are several pages here. Okay, the Talmud in Gittin that I already mentioned a bit. The Talmud brings the case of one who buys wine from the Cutheans, the dispute of the tanna’im there, and then it says as follows. Rav Mesharshiya said to Rava—the first source before you—“But Rabbi Yehuda, who when it depends on his own decision does not accept retroactive clarification, and when it depends on others’ decision does accept retroactive clarification…” If it depends on his own decision he does not accept retroactive clarification, as it was taught: “One who buys wine from the Cutheans says, ‘Two logs that I will in the future separate are terumah, ten are first tithe, nine are second tithe,’ and he redeems and drinks immediately—these are the words of Rabbi Meir. Rabbi Yehuda and Rabbi Yosi and Rabbi Shimon forbid it.” So what do we see? That Rabbi Yehuda holds that in such a situation there is no retroactive clarification, right? Agreed? That in such a case there is no retroactive clarification. Because Rabbi Yehuda belongs to the tanna’im who forbid drinking, so he holds there is no retroactive clarification. And this is called depending on his own decision—he himself determines what will remain at the end. So if it depends on his own decision, there is no retroactive clarification. But when it depends on others’ decision, he does accept retroactive clarification, as we learned: “What is her status during those days?” Rabbi Yehuda says: “She is a married woman in every respect, and when he dies it is a bill of divorce.” So Rashi explains—come see Rashi below, and then we’ll continue. What does Rashi say? “What is her status during those days?” says Rashi: later on in the chapter ‘One Who Was Seized’—“This is your bill of divorce from now if I die from this illness.” He gives the woman a bill of divorce from now if he dies from this illness, yes, he is deathly ill and afraid that he will die from the illness he is in, so he gives the woman a bill of divorce from now if he dies from this illness. “It is a bill of divorce if he dies of that illness.” What is her status during all the days of the illness? And the question is: what is her law in the interim, from the moment he gave the bill of divorce until the day of his death? Fine? So the Talmud discusses this—what is her status during those days?—and the Talmud says that according to Rabbi Yehuda, she is a married woman in every respect. “And when he dies it is a bill of divorce.” So during those days she is a married woman in every respect. If she is a married woman in every respect, then “when he dies it is a bill of divorce,” so Rashi says: because the first clause teaches, “this is a bill of divorce.” And if so, according to Rabbi Yehuda, regarding “during those days”—it follows that he doesn’t disagree with the first clause and we don’t say “a bill of divorce after death,” since he said “from today.” And even though when he gave the bill of divorce he was uncertain whether he would live or die, and he made the condition depend on the decision of the One in whose hand his life and death rest, when he dies we say that the matter was clarified retroactively—that from the time of giving it, he was destined to die from this illness, and so it was a bill of divorce from that moment, because on that basis he gave it over. And this is not like other conditions that a person stipulates in a bill of divorce, conditions that are in his own power to fulfill and that he intends to fulfill when he stipulates them. And when the condition is fulfilled it becomes a bill of divorce retroactively; there the reason is not retroactive clarification. But here, since it is not in his power, and at the time of the condition it is uncertain, and the condition is fulfilled on its own—if not for retroactive clarification it would not be a bill of divorce during his lifetime. The case here is a bill of divorce with a condition. What does that have to do with retroactive clarification? That’s what troubles Rashi. Here we’re talking about an ordinary condition: “This is your bill of divorce if I die.” What does that have to do with retroactive clarification? Why connect it to retroactive clarification? So Rashi says, basically, in the language I used before, it’s not true that the difference between retroactive clarification and condition is that one is about one object and the other is about one object out of several objects. Here, the Talmud takes a case of one object and calls it retroactive clarification. It makes the dispute whether there is or isn’t retroactive clarification apply to such a case too. So once again the question returns: what is the difference between condition and retroactive clarification if so? Right? Earlier I said the difference is that in retroactive clarification I select one object from a group. In a condition, it’s one object, there’s just a condition whether it will take effect on it or not. Right? But now Rashi tells us, correctly, that from the Talmud here you see that when I make a condition on one object—meaning one woman whom I divorce only on condition that I die—and to that the Talmud refers as retroactive clarification. Why is that retroactive clarification? It’s a condition. So first of all, from the very difficulty that Rashi raises, what do we see? That fundamentally he did understand it as I said. He expected such a thing to belong to the category of condition, not retroactive clarification. And why? Because the simple understanding really is that condition is on one object and retroactive clarification is on several objects. But he says: the Talmud shows otherwise. What can you do? So Rashi says: then why nevertheless does it belong to retroactive clarification? He says: “And he made the condition depend on the decision of the One in whose hand his life and death rest. And when he died, we say that the matter was clarified retroactively—that from the time of giving it, he was fit to die from this illness, and so it was a bill of divorce from that moment, because on that basis he gave it over. And this is not like other conditions,” says Rashi, “that a person stipulates in a bill of divorce, conditions that are in his own power to fulfill and that he intends to fulfill when he stipulates them. And when the condition is fulfilled it is a bill of divorce retroactively.” That’s what happens in a regular condition: what? That it is in his power to fulfill it and he intends to fulfill it. Meaning, if I stipulate a condition that is in my power, and I also intend to fulfill it, that is a condition. And that can be done. So if in the end I do not fulfill it, then indeed the act does not take effect. Why? Because from the outset I intended to fulfill it and it was also in my power. That is called a condition. But if I make a condition on one object—not more—an ordinary condition, but this condition is not in my power to fulfill, or I do not intend to fulfill it, then it belongs to the category of retroactive clarification. So that would be… what?
[Speaker C] Because retroactive clarification comes back, as if the clarification is whether it’s in your hand or not? Instead of being about the object?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I didn’t understand.
[Speaker C] If the matter is in your power to do, then with respect to the object there’s sort of a yes or no.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Yes, but that’s a question of settled intent. If it’s in my power and I intend to fulfill it, that means that now I’ve already made up my mind, I know what I’m doing, so the act takes effect. But if it’s not in my power or not in my intention to fulfill it, then basically not… It’s like a condition in commandments. Then basically I didn’t really intend to do it, or at least not in a definite way. It’s not in my power and not in my intention—I’m making lotteries. You can’t make lotteries. You can make conditions on things that are in your power; you can’t make lotteries.
[Speaker C] So it’s not definite—that’s what I was trying. It’s not definite in you, not in the object. When you make an eruv and say “to the east or to the west,” then the retroactive clarification is on the object itself—
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] It—because he explains it regarding a single object, so it can’t be that the object is indefinite. So the indefiniteness is in you.
[Speaker C] Right. So maybe here then maybe it’s not… sort of.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] You have to say that, because here that’s what you see—that even with one object there is an issue of retroactive clarification. So you can no longer make the distinction between one object and choosing one from among several. That’s what Rashi notes here. And again, from his difficulty you see that he did understand it that way fundamentally. He’s just saying: fine, but that doesn’t work here. Okay?
[Speaker C] Maybe it does work here? Because although it’s one object, it’s different—it’s two objects in the mind, sort of; the clarification is within the intention of… whether yes or no.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] And that’s true in every condition.
[Speaker C] No, because when you say “if he comes to the east or to the west…”
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, that’s ordinary retroactive clarification. I’m now talking about an ordinary condition. Talk to me about a condition. I give her a bill of divorce on condition that she gives me two hundred zuz.
[Speaker C] Gives her—
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] A bill of divorce on condition that she gives me two hundred zuz. So if she gives it, it’s a bill of divorce, and if not, then not. So again there are two possibilities. Why is that a condition? According to everyone, it works. Why?
[Speaker B] But it’s not in his intention whether she’ll give it or not.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Yes, the medieval authorities already discuss that—maybe we’ll still see it later. Being in her intention to fulfill it is like being in his intention. As Nachmanides, for example, explains in Rashi. The meaning is that if the person who is party to the transaction truly intends to do it, then the other side of the transaction as well.
[Speaker B] So the advantage you suggested here, to make a condition east or west in eruv, according to Rashi it won’t work because it’s definitely not in his intention.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Because the sage has to arrive—it’s not in his intention, right. Correct. And therefore it belongs to retroactive clarification. And then according to Rashi it would indeed come out that even if you do it twice—good point—even if you do it twice, a condition on each eruv separately, according to Rashi it won’t help. “But here it is not in his power, and at the time of the condition it is uncertain, and the condition is fulfilled on its own; and if not for retroactive clarification it would not be a bill of divorce during his lifetime.” Look at Tosafot. I brought only a piece from the first Tosafot and a piece from the second, because together they complete the picture. “Explanation,” says Tosafot—he has some disagreement with Rashi in explaining the sugya there on page 73. I won’t go into the details of that sugya right now; it’s less important for our purposes. But Tosafot explains differently. “Explanation: when he said ‘from today,’ this means that the bill of divorce should take effect one hour before his death. And he did not mean specifically ‘from today’ literally, but rather ‘from the time I am in the world.’ And since he made the matter depend on his death, he is only concerned that the bill of divorce should take effect during his lifetime. And so too it appears from the Tosefta,” etc. What does that mean? Tosafot explains that the case there is not as Rashi described. Rashi explained that the condition there is structured as: I give the bill of divorce now if I die; on condition that I die, if I die it takes effect from now. Tosafot says no. The condition means from the time that I am in the world. Meaning, because if I say to her “This is your bill of divorce if I die” without saying “from now,” then I’m just speaking nonsense. Why? Because after I die I can no longer divorce her; she’s already a widow. Okay? So it has to be that the divorce takes effect while he is alive. I have to go back in time. Tosafot says: I don’t go back to the time of giving the bill of divorce or the time of saying it. I go back five minutes before my death. Fine? When I die, then one second before that you are divorced. Why?
[Speaker L] What does he gain there? Does he gain something better there? No, I understand, but why doesn’t he agree with Rashi that it’s from the moment of giving?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] There is a dispute there about the plain meaning of the Talmud on page 73. I skipped it—that’s the first part of Tosafot. I just don’t want to get into that sugya. Therefore, for our purposes, what matters is that Tosafot explains it differently. Why does that matter? Look at the next Tosafot. “And to say that his bill of divorce is based on the principle that there is retroactive clarification.” “The commentator,” meaning Rashi, “explained: even though it is a condition, it still requires retroactive clarification. Because if it were merely a condition, then everyone agrees about that, so why should it depend on the question whether there is retroactive clarification or not? Since it is not in his power, and at the time of the condition it is uncertain, and the condition is fulfilled on its own, if not for retroactive clarification it would not be a bill of divorce. And it is unlike other conditions that are in his power to fulfill and that he intends to fulfill.” Up to here, that is a quotation from Rashi. “However, here necessarily it cannot be except on the basis of retroactive clarification, since they explain it in the chapter ‘One Who Was Seized’ as meaning ‘from the time I am in the world’—that is, one hour before his death. And that hour when the bill of divorce takes effect is not defined and known, and therefore retroactive clarification is needed.”
[Speaker I] What is he saying—that there isn’t clarification here, sort of?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] What do you mean, clarification?
[Speaker I] Not “retroactive clarification” in the sense of something clear.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Why? According to Rashi, it isn’t retroactive clarification? According to Rashi, that’s exactly what he says: even with one object, even if you don’t have to select it from a group, it’s still relevant to discuss whether there is or isn’t retroactive clarification, even with one object.
[Speaker H] But according to Tosafot, that hour when the bill of divorce takes effect is not definite. Right. So what changed? The matter wasn’t clarified.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I think that is exactly what Tosafot is innovating here in the laws of retroactive clarification. He has a dispute about the plain sense of the Talmud on page 73, but for our purposes what matters is—look, understand that there is an essential difference between Tosafot’s case and Rashi’s case for our purposes, for our discussion, regardless of why Tosafot brings it. Why? Because according to Tosafot we can preserve the distinction I made earlier. According to Tosafot, the concept of retroactive clarification exists only when you want to select one object from among several. Because what happens now? If I say “This bill of divorce is your bill of divorce from now if I die,” then there is one object here, the woman, and I apply the divorce to her if the condition is fulfilled. And if it is not fulfilled, then I do not apply it. That’s a classic condition. But Tosafot says that’s not what the case is about. It’s about a situation where I give her a bill of divorce five minutes before I die. Now I don’t know when I’ll die, or whether I’ll die, etc. So there is a moment here that is not determined. The group is not a group of women; it’s a group of times. And that time will be clarified when he dies; it will become clear retroactively that the previous minute was the minute of divorce—which is exactly retroactive clarification in the usual definition. Clarification, real clarification. So I’m selecting one minute from a collection of minutes. Tosafot therefore retains the normal conception that the difference between retroactive clarification and condition is whether there are several objects. Therefore Tosafot says: if so, then this case really does belong under the concept of retroactive clarification and not under the concept of condition. Because this is not divorce on a condition; this is divorce at a moment that I select from a collection of moments on the basis of a future event—that I die. That’s truly retroactive clarification. What? What is a condition?
[Speaker B] What, if he says, “Be divorced when you give me two hundred zuz.” So if she gives it tomorrow, then it’s tomorrow. And if in two days, then it’s in two days.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No—“when you give me two hundred zuz” is not the same as “on condition that you give me two hundred zuz.”
[Speaker B] Fine—“on condition that you give me two hundred zuz.” What’s the problem? Obviously it’s the same thing. But here too it’s at the moment I die, or the moment before I die.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Obviously it’s the same thing. What? Obviously it’s the same thing. If you tell me “a minute before you give me two hundred zuz,” that is the same thing; it would depend on the question of retroactive clarification. “On condition that you give me two hundred zuz” is not that. “On condition that you give me two hundred zuz” means: I divorce you now, provided that within two weeks you give me two hundred zuz. If I wanted to select the moment, then indeed it would be the same as here. Obviously. According to Tosafot, that would depend on retroactive clarification. Since on the Torah level there is no retroactive clarification, in the final analysis it would not work. Because on the Torah level there is no retroactive clarification. Okay. So Tosafot, through the discussion in the sugya itself, explains differently from Rashi. But practically, in the bottom line, what comes out is that there is no difficulty at all about why this belongs to retroactive clarification. It really is a case of retroactive clarification. But notice what Tosafot emphasizes here. He says at the end: “Nonetheless, Rashi is still correct, because even in a condition one may require retroactive clarification. For ‘I am having relations with you on condition that my father approves’ is considered later on to be retroactive clarification.” Tosafot says: here I argued with Rashi in the sugya on page 73. But I fully understand the significance of the issue also for the law of retroactive clarification, in that I effectively preserved the conception of retroactive clarification—that retroactive clarification is always one object from among several, and not about one object. But, says Tosafot, know that here I saved that conception. Yet in truth Rashi is right. Even in cases of one object we sometimes need retroactive clarification. What is Tosafot’s proof? From the continuation of the discussion. Now let’s return to the Talmud, read the continuation, and see Tosafot’s proof. So the continuation of the Talmud says as follows. Rav Mesharshiya said to Rava—you can see there on the fourth line—“But Rabbi Shimon, who when it depends on his own decision does not accept retroactive clarification, and when it depends on others’ decision does accept retroactive clarification?” When it depends on his own decision he does not accept retroactive clarification—that is the case we already mentioned, one who buys wine from the Cutheans. Which is like Rabbi Yehuda, who says it is forbidden to drink; so there is no retroactive clarification. When it depends on others’ decision, he does accept retroactive clarification, as it was taught: “I am having relations with you on condition that my father approves. Even though the father did not approve, she is betrothed. Rabbi Shimon ben Yehuda says in the name of Rabbi Shimon: if the father approved, she is betrothed; if the father did not approve, she is not betrothed.” So what do we see? “You are betrothed to me on condition that my father approves” is a classic condition, right? Again the question returns: so why does the Talmud tie this to the question whether there is or isn’t retroactive clarification? What does this prove, that according to Rabbi Shimon there is retroactive clarification when it depends on others’ decision? This is not retroactive clarification; it’s a condition. A condition is accepted by everyone—what does this have to do with it? Fine? So again Rashi’s question returns: why is it tied to retroactive clarification? What would Rashi answer to this? He doesn’t say anything about it, but it’s obvious what he would answer.
[Speaker G] It’s not in his power.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Right. It’s not in his power; it depends on his father’s decision. Therefore it is retroactive clarification. Therefore Tosafot says: it’s true that regarding “This is your bill of divorce from the time I am in the world,” that belongs to the issue of retroactive clarification and so there is no difficulty from there; from there you do not need to innovate Rashi’s novelty, and Rashi’s proof is not correct. But the principle Rashi wants to prove is still correct; it is proven from the next case. He said interesting things: he brought an incorrect proof for a correct claim. That’s a derashah. We talked about the difference between derashah and pilpul—so this is derashah. Fine. So apparently what emerges from here is that Rashi is necessarily right. That one cannot distinguish between choosing an object from a group—that being retroactive clarification—and referring to one defined object—that being a condition. This distinction does not stand up to scrutiny, even though, again, Rashi too assumed that distinction until he raised the difficulty, and Tosafot too, as you see, tries to save that distinction, but in the end Tosafot says he doesn’t succeed. Okay, so it doesn’t work. Let’s see Nachmanides. Nachmanides brings Rashi’s explanation—I’ll quote from the middle somewhat: “According to this explanation, ‘from now if I die,’ ‘from today if I die,’ and all bills of divorce of a deathly ill person—according to the one who holds there is no retroactive clarification—it is not a bill of divorce.” The Talmud is full of conditions that don’t depend on a person and are not in his power. For example, the bill of divorce of a deathly ill person. The bill of divorce of a deathly ill person is a conditional bill of divorce, the condition being that he die, and he makes it depend on the One in whose hand his life rests, so it doesn’t depend on him. Okay, the Talmud ties it to conditions. According to Rashi the answer comes out, and they tie it to the question whether there is or isn’t retroactive clarification. The question is much harder, because practically we rule that on the Torah level there is no retroactive clarification. It’s not just that it depends on a dispute; practically we should cry out that such a thing does not work. So even if you say there’s a dispute, that’s not enough, because we also rule like the side of the dispute that says it doesn’t work. But the Talmud says that it does work. So there’s a problem here. “And this matter is very difficult for us, because we hold that on the Torah level there is no retroactive clarification, like Rabbi Oshaya who said so in the chapter ‘One Who Borrows’ and in Beitzah”—I mentioned that already—“and Ameimar taught: the law follows Rabbi Oshaya. Yet we also hold that when he dies it is a bill of divorce.” Yes, so there’s a problem here. “And further, we find that Shmuel holds there is no retroactive clarification…” He raises various difficulties. “And there are those who explain it thus,” from the next paragraph. “Actually, ‘from today if I die,’ ‘from now if I die’—according to the rabbis who say she is fully divorced provided he dies—that is not because of retroactive clarification. For even if you say there is no retroactive clarification, it is a valid bill of divorce because it takes effect from now. And the fact that we prove that Rabbi Yehuda accepts retroactive clarification from this…” Yes, Rashi’s difficulty: after all, the Talmud proves from the case of “from today if I die” that there is retroactive clarification, right? But Nachmanides says, wait—that’s a condition; what does it have to do with retroactive clarification? So if so, what is the Talmud proving from here about retroactive clarification? “Because we hold in the chapter ‘One Who Was Seized’ that this is the reason of Rabbi Yehuda, who says she is a married woman—that he does not explain ‘from now’ literally, because he says ‘from today if I die’ means ‘the day I die,’ that is, one hour before death.” Then even when he says “from today,” in practice it is interpreted literally like Tosafot: meaning the moment before my death. And because it is so, it truly belongs to the issue of retroactive clarification. He tried to make it a condition, but the interpretation we give his words is an interpretation of retroactive clarification: he wants to select one minute from ten minutes, as Tosafot explained. So if that’s the case, then from there it really is an issue of retroactive clarification and not a condition. And Nachmanides indeed remains with the conception that the difference between retroactive clarification and condition is what I said earlier: retroactive clarification is selecting one thing out of several things, and condition is not. However, Nachmanides still owes us explanations, because Tosafot said there is the next case, right? In this case Rashi is not necessary, but there is the next case, “on condition that my father approves.” And there it’s clear that it’s a condition, and seemingly the Talmud ties it to retroactive clarification. What does Nachmanides do with that? So Nachmanides says: “And this explanation works for all of them. But the case of Rabbi Shimon is difficult.” This is Rabbi Yehuda—that’s fine, we managed with that. But the continuation of the Talmud that speaks about Rabbi Shimon is difficult, because it proves that Rabbi Shimon accepts retroactive clarification because he says “If the father approved, she is betrothed.” Even though at the time of intercourse it was uncertain whether he would approve or not, we say that the matter was clarified retroactively, that from the time of intercourse there was betrothal. It certainly seems that whenever one makes something depend on a condition that lies in the authority of others, the act is effective only according to the one who says there is retroactive clarification. What Tosafot noted, yes? That from there you really see that the distinction doesn’t work—that retroactive clarification is always selecting one thing from a group—because here it is really one object. And here too, if so, you would have to say that the difference is as Rashi says: that if it depends on others’ decision, it belongs to the issue of retroactive clarification even if we are talking about a single object. But Nachmanides refuses to say that. Nachmanides says no; he is unwilling to give it up. “And so too it appears in the chapter ‘Everyone Makes an Eruv,’ in the first chapter of Hullin…” He has more proofs. “And this case in Kiddushin is harder than the first one, because even if he says to the woman, ‘on condition that you give me two hundred zuz,’ we should also say the same.” I’m reading from three lines before the end of that paragraph, yes? “Even if he says to the woman, ‘You are betrothed to me on condition that you give me two hundred zuz,’” that certainly works—that’s an explicit Talmud, there’s no dispute about it. Now according to Rashi, he did not make it depend on his own power; it depends on her, so it belongs to the issue of retroactive clarification, and on the Torah level we rule there is no retroactive clarification. Here Nachmanides says: rather, one can say that a condition that lies in the woman’s power is like a condition that lies in his own power, and his mind relies on it from the moment of giving, because she intends to do it—after all, she intends to become betrothed to him—so it’s like he intended it. If both parties truly intend the transaction seriously, it is not called retroactive clarification; that is the issue of condition. Fine? That is Nachmanides’ answer. “Nevertheless, the law remains difficult concerning the bill of divorce of a deathly ill person. And on the Torah level we hold there is no retroactive clarification. And if so, it remains difficult that we hold: ‘You are betrothed to me on condition that my father approves’—if the father approves she is betrothed; if he does not approve she is not betrothed.” Fine? So he says as follows: “And still I say that ‘on condition that my father approves’ is different.” What “my father approves” was difficult for his thesis—you see, Nachmanides insists all the way through. Rashi already said this in the first case. Tosafot said the first case is not right, but in the second there is no choice. Nachmanides says: even in the second I’ll explain it to you. Meaning—even there it’s not true. Meaning, Nachmanides really remains, also in the bottom line, with the standard conception of the difference between condition and retroactive clarification: retroactive clarification is choosing one object from among several, and condition is just one object. So how does he explain “on condition that my father approves,” which was the difficulty? He says that since the matter is entrusted to the heart, we do not say, when the father approves now, that the matter was clarified that he approved from the outset—except according to the view that there is retroactive clarification. And so it appears in Eruvin. “And when we rule like the anonymous Mishnah that teaches ‘You are betrothed to me on condition that my father approves,’ according to Rabbi Yosef, if a Mishnah…” In short, what he says is that things that depend on the heart belong to retroactive clarification. He says: things that depend on the heart. What does “depend on the heart” mean? Non-deterministic. Right. I think that’s what he means. Something that depends on a person’s decision. Something that depends on a person’s decision is non-deterministic, and therefore it depends on the issue of retroactive clarification. According to the one who says there is no retroactive clarification, it won’t work. That’s basically what he says. And why? As I said earlier, I said earlier that the one who says there is retroactive clarification—basically the standard accepted conception, which is really Nachmanides’ conception—is that you select one entity from among several. How can you do that? Because I define this object through one of its future properties. Now the question is: what is needed in order to define this object through a future property? Does the information have to exist, or only the truth-value? Remember the distinctions I made. Meaning, if the thing is a future event but a natural event, then the truth-value exists and the information exists too. I don’t know it, but the information exists. The Holy One, blessed be He, knows whether it will rain tomorrow or not. But if it depends on human choice, then even the Holy One, blessed be He, does not know. The truth-value already exists today, but the information does not. The one who says there is no retroactive clarification claims that the truth-value is not enough to define an object; the information has to exist. So in natural events, where the information also exists, there’s no problem, and that really is just a condition, not retroactive clarification—no problem at all. But if we are talking about a non-deterministic future event, about a human decision, then the information does not exist, and you cannot define the object. That depends on the issue of retroactive clarification. So says Nachmanides. So even in a situation where you have a single object and not several, but you make the condition depend on a future event that depends on a person’s decision—something entrusted to the heart—that belongs to the issue of retroactive clarification. And now look, he continues.
[Speaker C] And in Eruvin too it’s like that, no? Isn’t it the sage’s decision where he’ll come? That’s what he says.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] That’s what he says; it’s the same in Eruvin. He says exactly this. But in Eruvin you don’t need to get to that, because in Eruvin, in any case, we’re talking about two eruvs. Where would the practical difference be? If I make the stipulation twice, on each of the eruvs. I’ll construct it as two conditions. So we saw earlier two possibilities as to whether that would work or not, right? Nachmanides says that even if you construct it as two conditions, it still won’t help, because each one of the conditions makes it depend on the sage’s decision where to go. That’s something entrusted to the heart, and since that’s so, it’s not deterministic; you can’t do it even in the form of two conditions. Even though in Eruvin you certainly don’t need to get to this underlying principle, there’s no difficulty from there, because you didn’t do it as two conditions; you did it with both eruvs together. He says: “But if one makes it depend on the will of others or on his own will, even though he did not make the condition about two things”—if Rabban Gamliel had said to a woman, “Behold, you are betrothed to me on condition that rain falls from now until thirty days,” then if rain falls she is certainly betrothed, as the Jerusalem Talmud says in Kiddushin. The line—I’m reading line six, last paragraph. “But a person does not make a condition about two things.” You see? He is the one who defines it in the sharpest way: selection means deciding on one thing מתוך a group. That is what is called selection. That’s how he understands the concept of selection. “For example, one who says: whichever one goes out through the entrance first,” and, “the two log that I am going to separate,” because the act may be exchanged, and his intention is not clarified from the first moment regarding this event that will occur. “And so too is the law in the case where one stipulates: if the sage comes to the east, my eruv is to the east; to the west, my eruv is to the west.” And once again he returns to Eruvin—why? Because really, in Eruvin there are both elements. Even if it were one object, it would still belong to selection, because it depends on a person’s intention. Besides that, he is also doing it with both eruvs together, so it belongs to selection in any case. All right? “Rather, in all these cases the act is not valid except according to the one who says there is selection. But if one says: if the sage comes to the east, my eruv is to the east, and if not, my eruv is void”—that is exactly constructing this eruv in the form of two things—then it takes effect according to everyone, provided that he makes the condition in the act. “But if one makes it depend on the will of others or on his own will, even though he did not make the condition about two things”—here this is a distinction I’m a bit unsure about, because here it seems a bit that if it’s an act that depends on a choice, then he is willing to accept it. Only if it’s a choice that remains only in thought, in the will, then not. It’s not entirely clear to me why he makes this distinction. But that’s what he wants to claim here. Right. “Even though he did not make the condition about two things, we do not say that now, when he wants it, the matter has become clarified that he wanted it from the first moment, except according to the one who says there is selection. And that is what was meant in our passage: ‘on condition that my father wants,’ as I explained.”
[Speaker M] “If the sage comes”—doesn’t that mean the sage has already come?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] What do you mean, already come?
[Speaker M] Open, you shall open. So he brings the Talmud and says: Rabbi Yohanan said, “The sage has already come.” I didn’t read it. Right.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, that’s what the Talmud rejects afterward. The Talmud says: don’t make it depend on selection, because the sage has already come; I just don’t know whether he came. That’s the Talmud’s rejection there. But I’m asking: why, at the beginning, didn’t they interpret it as “the sage has come”? Then it really does depend on selection, and the question is why. Got it? In short, what Nachmanides is really doing here is staying with the simple conception that selection means choosing one object out of several objects, and a condition is when there is one defined object. He just adds one more thing: if the stipulation, in a condition involving one object, depends on a person’s will, that too belongs to selection. That’s a qualification, but in principle the definition of selection and condition is like what we said earlier. And then, according to the one who says there is selection, why can this be done? Because you identify this object through a future property, what I said before. So what’s the problem? There is selection. According to the one who says there is no selection, he says you cannot impose legal effect on an undefined object, and therefore it is worse than a condition. By contrast, according to Rashi, it really seems that he has no problem imposing legal effect on an undefined object. How do I know that? Because Rashi says that even according to the one who says there is no selection, the legal effect still takes effect. So no—he has no problem with that. Therefore it is clear that he does not understand selection that way. The dispute over whether there is or is not selection he does not understand that way. Rather what? He makes it depend on the question whether it depends on something in his power, or whether it is within his intention to fulfill it—the question of settled intent. So it is not a question of selecting one thing from within a group. According to Nachmanides, it remains that way; according to Rashi, he proves from the Talmud here that it does not. Because in fact even with one object there is selection. So then what is it? Everything is a question of whether there is settled intent or there is no settled intent. If you meant it, then you have settled intent; if you didn’t mean it, then you don’t have settled intent. Okay? And according to Rashi, it really turns into—now here I’m a bit uncertain, because as I told you when I already read Rashi, and Tosafot too, we saw something like this—that it may be that in the end almost all the medieval authorities (Rishonim) are going in roughly the same direction, with subtle differences. Because Rashi too, in the end, assumes that the definition—because that’s what he asks. At first he assumed that a condition is one object out of several objects, and selection is with one object. Only afterward he is forced to explain that here it is not like that, because the Talmud says that even with one object it depends on selection. But it could be that he does not abandon the basic conception. Clearly, anything involving two objects will be selection. A case of one object will be a condition. But one object that does not depend on his intention and is not in his power to fulfill—not in his intention to fulfill and not in his power to fulfill—that too belongs to selection. He does not dispute the basic distinction from which he started, and Tosafot is the same. In Tosafot it is quite clear that this is so, because in the first case he himself says that we remain with the regular definition—“from today if” and “when,” right? And only in the second case does he retreat. Why? Because he remains with the basic definition, and only in the second case he says: but Rashi is right regarding a certain kind of case. So if that’s so, then there is also no dispute between Rashi and Tosafot, and no dispute between both of them and Nachmanides, except in the finer definitions. There is a dispute, but the logic is a similar logic. Basically, everyone agrees that when you select one object out of several objects, that is selection; and when you decide on legal effect for one object, that is a condition. And everyone agrees that there are also situations involving one object where it will depend on selection, because that is what the Talmud says. The whole question is how to explain it. Rashi says: anything that is in his power and within his intention to fulfill.