Topics in Talmudic Logic, Lecture 8

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[Speaker D] But I’m saying, let’s say, if I didn’t have winnowing—if I were missing winnowing—I wouldn’t be able to derive liability for this from it.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] That’s correct, exactly.

[Speaker D] Whereas with selecting, as if—without selecting maybe I would be able to.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, without selecting you also wouldn’t be able to.

[Speaker D] How would you learn it from winnowing?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Obviously not—how can you learn it? You need the labor itself to already be forbidden even before the wind’s help, and then you ask: wait, does the wind’s assistance exempt me? So I say, I learn from winnowing that it doesn’t. But first of all, you need the thing itself to be defined as a forbidden labor.

[Speaker D] But isn’t it also defined in winnowing, as it were, on its own?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] But winnowing is separation; here there’s no separation. This is throwing. You need the action—leave the wind aside for a moment—the action itself, say if you had done it by hand, you need to define it as a forbidden action, and only afterward do you ask: now I did that action with the wind. That I learn from winnowing—that it doesn’t get in the way.

[Speaker D] I’m asking: without selecting, winnowing itself is also, as it were, separating one thing from another. Winnowing, well, both and both—it’s that.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] What?

[Speaker D] So if, as it were, I didn’t have the labor of selecting, I could manage with just winnowing.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] You could manage with just winnowing for what? For spitting?

[Speaker D] No—for separating one thing from another.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Of course—these are two different labors, and you can manage with either one without the other. But they are two. There is winnowing, which is with the help of the wind, and there is selecting, which is without the help of the wind.

[Speaker D] It’s exactly the same action. I’m saying: without this I could have learned wind assistance; without this I couldn’t have learned wind assistance.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Right, that’s why I learn it from winnowing and not from selecting. I’m saying it can’t be that the spitter is a subcategory of winnowing,

[Speaker D] because

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Winnowing is separating things. In that sense it’s like selecting. And throwing—or spitting—in the public domain separates nothing from anything. It cannot be a subcategory of winnowing. Winnowing is some kind of line, a line, as it were. Meaning, it’s some kind of aid that tells you: don’t be bothered by the fact that there was assistance here, there was help from the wind—it does not exempt. You violated the labor of carrying four cubits or throwing four cubits in the public domain, and don’t be bothered by the fact that the wind was involved here. In winnowing we see that such a thing does not exempt. Now this actually tells us that in order to derive the case of spitting in the public domain, I really need two teachers: winnowing and throwing. Agreed? Spitting is a subcategory of two primary categories, winnowing and throwing. If one of them didn’t exist, I wouldn’t be able to impose liability for spitting. Right? Seemingly this is exactly the common denominator.

[Speaker B] I have two teachers and I—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Take from both of them something shared, and from that I derive the thing. If I were missing one of them, I couldn’t derive it. Let’s formulate it exactly like the common denominator. Look, I’ll give you the whole formulation the way the Talmud does it. I say: let’s derive spitting from winnowing, because look—here the wind helps, and here too the wind helps. You say: what can you say about winnowing? It’s a labor of separation. In spitting, you’re not separating anything from anything, right? So I say: throwing will prove it. Because in throwing you’re not separating anything from anything, and still one is liable. But what about throwing? There’s no involvement of wind in it. Involvement of wind? I say: winnowing will prove it. Because in winnowing we see there is involvement of wind, and it does not exempt. And so the argument returns: this is not like that, and that is not like this. Winnowing and throwing together teach me about spitting. Exactly a common denominator, right? Except for this tiny little problem: there is no common denominator here.

[Speaker D] Both are forbidden on the Sabbath.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Right, but that’s not a common denominator. From “both are forbidden on the Sabbath” you could derive that everything is forbidden on the Sabbath.

[Speaker D] No, no, again, again.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Why not derive it from building? That too is forbidden on the Sabbath.

[Speaker D] That’s not the common denominator between winnowing and throwing.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] What is the common denominator? “Both are forbidden on the Sabbath” is not… that’s the law. I’m asking: what is shared by the two of them? That’s the law I want to derive. Remember? In a common denominator there are two teachers. In both there is a certain law—say, primary categories of damages. So let’s say I derive something from fire and pit together, okay? So fire incurs liability for damages and pit incurs liability for damages. That’s the law that exists in pit and fire. Besides that, fire and pit have characteristics. Right? We talked about this—that’s what we kept discussing, all these alphas and betas. They have characteristics. Now when I want to derive “his stone, his knife, and his burden that fell from the roof,” I need to use the characteristics to see whether it resembles fire and pit. It doesn’t resemble either one of them, but if I take both of them together, then just as they create liability, so too “his stone, his knife, and his burden” creates liability. So the law is not relevant. The law cannot be the common denominator of the two teachers. The law is what I want to derive.

[Speaker C] Winnowing and throwing—that’s fine. Something is thrown, an object is thrown. Here by a person, and here by the wind. What’s similar between such things?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Winnowing is a labor of separation. What exactly is shared between that and winnowing? That something moves? So what? Obviously something moves. In plowing too something moves—the cow, the ox walks in the field. So what? So what if something moves? In the essence of the labor there is no connection whatsoever. This is a labor of separation, and that is a labor of transfer of four cubits. What exactly is the connection between those two?

[Speaker D] Basically, the case we’re trying to derive has this feature and that feature, but those features are not shared.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Exactly. You keep getting one step ahead of me every time, but that means the didactics are working properly. Meaning, exactly—that’s the point. Notice, I formulated everything as though there were a common denominator. But the fact is: there is no common denominator. Let me remind you once again of the basic structure of a common denominator. Look, let’s recall for a moment.

[Speaker B] I have one teacher, let’s call it A, and the second teacher is B, and I have the derived case—we’ll call it C. Now from A I want to derive C—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] From A. So I say: what can you say about A? It has X, and this one doesn’t have X—X-bar. Okay? Then I say: this one will prove it. Then you say: no, this one has Y and this one doesn’t have Y. Right? And then I say: neither of them teaches me by itself, and so the argument returns. The common denominator between them—that Z which exists here too—apparently that is what is responsible for this law, and therefore the law P that exists in B also exists in C. All right? If A has the law P and B has the law P, then C too has the law P. Okay?

[Speaker E] So—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] The law P is not one of the sides—you have to understand that. I want to add here: this is Y-bar and this is X-bar. Exactly. The sides I’m talking about are the characteristics. Right? What has to be equal or different between the teachers and the derived case? The common denominator is that Z, its characteristic. Say, if both “normally move and cause damage,” or both are “your property and their safeguarding is your responsibility.” That is the common denominator in damages. Okay? The fact that both are liable for damage is not called a common denominator. That’s the law I want to derive: that if this is liable for damage—that’s P—and this is liable for damage, I want to derive that this too is liable for damage. I can’t say that they have a common denominator because both involve liability for damage. That is not the common denominator. That is the law I want to derive. If they both have a common denominator that I call Z, then apparently the law P is learned from Z. If the law P is learned from Z, and this one also has Z, then this one too will have the law P. But P itself cannot serve as the common denominator. Okay? Now let’s go back to the example of winnowing and throwing. So now I have winnowing and throwing, and I want to derive from that the spitter. So I start with throwing. I say: what can you say about throwing? No wind is involved in it, whereas here wind is involved. It does it by itself; this does not do it by itself. X is doing it alone without the help of the wind. All right? Then I say: winnowing will prove it. So I say: yes, because it does have wind. But still—in that one it is a labor of separating, and in this one it is not a labor of separating. Right? Here this is Y-bar. And so the argument returns: this is not like that, because here there is X and there there is no X; this is not like that, because here there is Y and there there is no Y. The common denominator in both of them is that—well, what exactly? There is nothing.

[Speaker B] There is no common denominator.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] In two primary categories of damages there is Z, namely “your property and their safeguarding is your responsibility.” Besides the unique characteristics like “its own action causes damage,” “another force is involved in it”—there is something: “your property and their safeguarding is your responsibility.” That is what is shared, right? That’s Z. Here there is nothing shared. The fact that here one is liable on the Sabbath and here one is liable on the Sabbath—that’s the law P. That is not supposed to function as the common denominator. It is the law I want to derive.

[Speaker D] So what are the characteristics now? What are the characteristics that, as it were, mark it out?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] X—X is that it is done by itself, without wind, right? By itself. And Y is a labor of separating.

[Speaker H] So in a situation like that, if you bring a Z that solves it, one could agree with you logically—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] But—maybe the board, by the way? In red?

[Speaker H] No, black is better; it’ll come out in the photo. Yes. If you now bring a Z that solves this diagram, one can still agree with you logically but not agree with you about that Z—that it’s relevant to the law.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Could be—that’s always the case. We said that last time too, definitely. You have to decide in advance about the relevance; you decide that by reasoning. It doesn’t come out of the algorithm—on the contrary, it is the foundation of the algorithm. So you understand, there’s something problematic here: there is no Z. And therefore what I’m claiming is that what happens here is that a—

[Speaker D] A main characteristic of throwing is missing. What? Basically, not a labor of separating. As if, after all, this is not a labor of separating.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Exactly. It’s not a labor of separating; what it is, is a labor of transfer.

[Speaker D] Yes, simply because what’s shared by this and this is this.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] You can add something else here if you want, and this is Z and this is Z-bar.

[Speaker D] Yes, simply—it’s this set.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Yes, so that’s not important for our purposes, only how to formalize it. Now, I claim the following claim: although the structure invites us to treat it as a common denominator, because it really looks like two teachers, each one has special features, and somehow from the two of them together emerges what does not emerge from each one alone—the same miracle that happens in the common denominator happens here—but this derivation is actually the different sides, not the common denominator. What do I mean? The claim is this: basically, in this structure here, I use—let’s say this is the set of features of A and this is the set of features of B. Fine? What I’m doing is taking the intersection between them, right? The shared feature is Z. X and Y are not in the intersection; they are not shared by both. And their intersection is actually what teaches me what happens here, right? Here I’m taking a union, not an intersection—the whole expansion of this set of features. I’m basically saying: if there is a labor that is not a labor of separating and wind is involved in it, then for that too I impose liability. That is also from the two different things. Meaning, it’s both Y and X. Do you understand? After all, the union of these two—X and X-bar—their union is X. And Y and Y-bar, their union is Y, right? So the union gives me X and Y. What is X and Y? X and Y is a labor of separating—a labor of transfer that is not a labor of separating—and X, that it is not done alone, X-bar, that it is not done alone. Okay. And if I arrive at this, that this is the union, and that is exactly what exists in this matter—I would have needed the Z here to do, never mind. So if these two characteristics exist in the subcategory, then for that too one is liable on the Sabbath. Where is there a characteristic? The characteristic that it is not done alone but with the help of the wind, and that it is not a labor of separating. Right? It is not a labor of separating and it is not done alone.

[Speaker B] I didn’t understand the union between the two sets.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I’m saying, I take from here—after all, what is the characteristic from here, what is the unique characteristic here? That it is not a labor of separating—that is not.

[Speaker B] What characterizes it?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] That it is done with the help of the wind, right? And what characterizes this? That it is a labor of separating—that is the positive characteristic, not what it is not, but what it is. Now take these two things together. All right? And say—sorry, one second. Here it is that it is not done with the help of the wind—that this is done with the help of the wind, right? Here this is X-bar. And here it is that it is not a labor of separating, right? Now “not a labor of separating” and “done with the help of the wind” together gives you spitting. Right? So the combination of these two things actually produces the subcategory for me—not the intersection, the combination. And now I’ll say it in human language, not in terms of intersections and unions. What? No, they are both positive for our purposes.

[Speaker B] One, you’re saying, is no; one is yes.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] What do you mean, no? If you define the no as yes, then the yes will be no. What does that mean? A thing done with the help of the wind is yes, but what is not done with the help of the wind is no. If you define what is done by itself as yes, then what is done with the help of the wind is no. It doesn’t matter what you call it. The question whether a feature is positive or negative is only a matter of definition. The claim is basically that in this case the formalism is the opposite of the common denominator, even though it looks very similar—completely the opposite. And what I am really doing—I call it conceptual construction. Meaning, I take two concepts and fuse from both of them together some composite concept. The concept of winnowing, where basically there is a schema like this: a labor done with the help of the wind. That I learn from winnowing—that it’s fine. From throwing I learn that throwing is a labor. Now insert the labor into the template: a labor done with the help of the wind. Insert throwing—throwing done with the help of the wind is exactly the spitter. All right? Meaning, I am basically taking one component from here and one component from here, and I claim that if I join them together, that can produce a new labor for me. But it is not a common denominator of the two teachers. On the contrary: it is taking the two different sides of each of them and fusing them with one another to produce a new concept.

[Speaker B] Why isn’t it enough for me to take winnowing and say: it is a labor, it is done by means of the wind—anything that is a labor and is done by means of the wind?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, now you’re trying to define what a labor is. What is a labor?

[Speaker B] They defined for us the thirty-nine labors; they already did that for us.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] But what is a labor? Maybe this too is a labor—maybe spitting is also a labor. How do you know? How is labor defined? No, you don’t know that this is a labor; you know that one is liable for throwing. You’re just laundering the words. You’re taking the law—that one is liable for this on the Sabbath—and turning it into a characteristic. I already said: the law cannot be the common denominator. The law is P. The common denominator has to be X, Y, or Z. The law itself is not a common denominator. The fact that both are liable on the Sabbath is not a common denominator. You need to find a common denominator in their characteristics, and then you say that Sabbath liability is a function of the common denominator. But the liability itself, the very liability on the Sabbath, is not the common denominator—just like in damages. What is the common denominator of the primary categories of damages? That one is liable for them? No, obviously not. Rather, that they are your property and their safeguarding is your responsibility. That is the common denominator—that’s a characteristic of the alphas and betas, and it is not the law. The law is what I want to derive; it is not the common denominator of the two things. The common denominator is always their characteristics. Okay. So you are basically defining something for which one is liable on the Sabbath as a labor, and that’s just a definition.

[Speaker H] You can derive from this also something that isn’t new. For example, if you take X Y—it is done alone and selecting—then that’s just selecting.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Right, right. In principle, nice point, a good point. In principle, one could have derived selecting from these two by the reverse union.

[Speaker B] Selecting—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] It is an action that is in fact an act of separating, done without wind. So look, now let’s do the reverse move. I want to derive selecting from winnowing. No—winnowing is done by wind. I don’t know if selecting can be derived from winnowing. Throwing will prove it, because throwing is done without wind and one is liable. So therefore, clearly—then he says, fine, but throwing is not a labor that separates. All right, so winnowing will prove it. And so the argument returns—again, not really “returns,” of course, because here it’s not a common denominator—but I join these two things in the opposite direction, and I can produce selecting from these two. So then what do you say? Then why does it say selecting? That’s a question.

[Speaker G] It’s a subcategory—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] And not a primary category, no?

[Speaker G] So spitting is not selecting, basically.

[Speaker D] So, as it were, it’s the same reason as before: because in the Temple there were thirty-nine.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] First of all, that’s first of all. The Talmud itself, after all, says that really it’s not worth having a separate primary category, even before all my moves. Second, there’s a non-trivial logical process here; it’s a little tricky. I’m thinking about it now because your point is a good point—I’ll think about it more. There’s something tricky here. Throwing is not itself a primary category of labor; it itself is learned from other primary categories. So before there was the system of primary categories, I also wouldn’t have known throwing. Right? So how can I derive selecting from throwing and winnowing? Throwing itself is a subcategory of the thirty-nine primary categories of labor in some way. Now, it’s not entirely smooth, because I can derive throwing from carrying from a private domain to a public domain, or from carrying four cubits in the public domain. I don’t need selecting for it, so it’s not circular. I don’t need selecting for it, but still, in status, it’s basically deriving a subcategory from a subcategory. And by the way, there is a dispute between Rashi and Rabbeinu Chananel on the question whether subcategories are derived from subcategories at the beginning of the chapter Klal Gadol. It says there, regarding watering seeds—the question is how that is a subcategory of sowing. Watering. So here, for example, is a case that would not have allowed deriving selecting. In truth, seemingly this is proof for Rabbeinu Chananel. And here we see otherwise. Indeed, the labor of selecting is unnecessary. Right—but since the Talmud itself says that the labor of selecting is unnecessary, it’s a weak question. We said: fine, we included it because we need thirty-nine primary categories of labor, but really this is a labor that is in fact unnecessary; it could have been derived from other labors as well. It’s just that usually the perception is the opposite, of course—that winnowing is the unnecessary one and needs to be derived from selecting, not that selecting is the unnecessary one and is derived from winnowing—because the usual perception is that if the wind is involved then it’s easier. Meaning, what is done without wind is more obligating; it is the stronger case. Yes, so to derive selecting… what?

[Speaker B] From this one derives from damages? But why? Because it’s easier?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Yes, that’s pretty obvious—reasoning, yes. Anyway, so the claim I basically want to make—I actually jumped straight to the end—is that there are logical structures that look very similar to the common denominator. There are two teachers; each has a feature the other does not have, and vice versa; the derived case is learned from both together; neither one alone can teach it—really a common denominator except for one thing: there is no common denominator. Meaning, the scheme is like the scheme of common denominator in name, but there is no actual common denominator here. Okay? And therefore what we have here is conceptual construction and not a common denominator, which is a completely different scheme. It is not one of the hermeneutic principles; it is not included among the hermeneutic principles of Rabbi Yishmael. It is a new hermeneutic principle. The Talmud made use of it. Meaning, the Minchat Eliyahu is a later authority who explains the Jerusalem Talmud perhaps in this way, so maybe you can include the Jerusalem Talmud in this—but I will show you other passages in the Talmud itself where they made use of this hermeneutic principle. So this is another hermeneutic principle; it is not the common denominator. It is something else. It’s its cousin, okay? If the common denominator is intersection, here it is union.

[Speaker B] That’s its aspect, yes.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Now I want to go back for a moment to the passage we saw and illustrate this with it. Let’s go back for a moment to the passage about “his stone, his knife, and his burden” that we already dealt with many, many classes ago. Let me remind you: the Talmud says that if someone placed his stone, his knife, and his burden on the roof, and they fell in a normal wind, came to rest in the public domain, and caused damage as a pit—okay, then you are liable. Why are you liable? You can’t derive it from pit, because there was involvement of the wind here, right? So I derive it from fire, because with fire there is involvement of the wind. But fire has the feature that it normally moves and causes damage, or all kinds of problematic features of fire, so one says: pit will prove it. Pit is static, whereas fire normally moves, so pit will prove it. So I need both fire and pit. Fine? And we derive it by the common denominator. I brought the Rosh, if you remember, there in that place, and I inferred from the Rosh that there are three views about what the law of the subcategory would be. We know that pit is exempt for vessels, right? Each of the primary categories of damages has a certain exemption. Horn, for example, for the first three times pays only half—an innocuous goring animal. Fire is exempt for hidden items. Pit is exempt for vessels, and so on. Tooth and foot are exempt in the public domain. Each of the primary categories of damages has some special exemption, okay? Now, when we derive “his stone, his knife, and his burden” from pit and fire, the question is: which exemptions will this “his stone, his knife, and his burden,” learned from both of them, have? Fire has an exemption for hidden items, and pit has an exemption for vessels. Which exemptions will “his stone, his knife, and his burden,” learned from both, have? We saw three views in the Rosh; we won’t go back through all that complication—we already saw it. One possibility is that it has both exemptions, which is of course the most sensible possibility. Right? Why? Because if you need both of them to derive the subcategory, how could you know otherwise? Regarding vessels, you won’t be able to impose liability for vessels in “his stone, his knife, and his burden,” because pit is exempt—so how can you derive from pit and fire liability of “his stone, his knife, and his burden”? For vessels, you don’t have pit, you only have fire; and for hidden items, you only have pit and not fire. Therefore, for hidden items and for vessels, you don’t have two sources from which you could derive liability of “his stone, his knife, and his burden” for hidden items and for vessels. So the logic says to exempt it in both ways, right? And that is the first view in the Rosh. The second view in the Rosh—and this I inferred, it isn’t written explicitly, but it’s pretty clear that he has such a view—is: it has none of the exemptions. And I explained there, I explained this to you. I think the idea is this: in the four primary categories of damages, after all, the Mishnah itself says: “their common denominator is that they are apt to cause damage and are your property and their safeguarding is your responsibility,” right? So now I already have a new principle that I learned from the four primary categories of damages together: anything that is my property and whose safeguarding is my responsibility carries liability. Okay? “His stone, his knife, and his burden” obviously enters that category. It is my property and its safeguarding is my responsibility. Right? So I am liable. Now I want to know: fine, but will it be exempt for hidden items? Let’s see—I learn it from fire. Wait, but it also resembles pit; it isn’t completely similar to… I can’t derive the exemption for hidden items. By the same token I also can’t derive the exemption for vessels. And the idea is that first of all you are liable. With the primary categories you use them only to derive the exemptions, not to derive the liability itself. And then what comes out is that you have no way to derive the exemptions, so you remain fully liable. That is the second approach in the Rosh. The third approach is the interesting one for us here. Because the Rosh himself rules in practice not that way. The Rosh himself claims that all the law of pit applies to them. There is exemption for vessels; there is no exemption for hidden items. In both cases, for “his stone, his knife, and his burden.” How can that be?

[Speaker G] Why, why not the opposite? Hidden items yes—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] And vessels no?

[Speaker G] Or—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Both, or neither? How did you decide specifically in favor of pit and not in favor of fire? What do you say? For that purpose I brought—let’s see how to understand it. Look, think for a moment about the common denominator there. In my view, the Rosh argues that the derivation in Bava Kamma 6 is not a common denominator; it is conceptual construction. If I ask you, for example, about spitting in the public domain, I’ll ask you: under what heading does he violate? A yes-no question. Under what heading does he violate? Give me a primary category of labor.

[Speaker D] Throwing? Yes. What? No way.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] What do you mean? It doesn’t resemble throwing at all. The essence of winnowing is separation—there is no separation there. The type of labor is throwing? It’s not throwing. Winnowing only comes to tell you: don’t exempt him because of the involvement of the wind, right? But after I learned that from winnowing, I go back—basically there is throwing here. Right? That is exactly what the Rosh says about “his stone, his knife, and his burden.” After all, it comes to rest on the ground. Someone stepped on it—that is exactly pit. He slipped on a banana peel, whatever—that’s pit. The only thing is that it got here from the roof via the wind, unlike pit, where I dig it with my hands. So for that I need to show from fire that if there is involvement of wind, that doesn’t interfere. Now ask me how it caused damage. Obviously it caused damage in the manner of pit, and in no other manner.

[Speaker E] So they gave more weight to one of the components of—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Exactly. So not just more weight—understand: if you ask me what this is, it is certainly pit. After all, it didn’t cause damage in the manner of fire; it didn’t cause damage while moving. It caused damage after it came to rest. Someone stepped on it in the public domain. Right? In the course of the Talmudic discussion… obviously, at first they wanted to speak about it causing damage while moving. In the end they said no—they established it as a case where it came to rest and only afterward caused damage. That’s completely pit. The only issue is that it is a problematic pit, because it is a pit in whose formation the wind was involved. So fire shows me that I don’t need to be troubled by that problem. After it shows me that I need not be troubled by that problem, I go back to the fact that this is pit. So the Rosh says: then what’s the problem? This is pit with all the laws of pit. All right? Exactly like throwing. In other words, this isn’t only from the angle of spitting; it’s also in damages, where there is conceptual construction. And it is not a common denominator, even though it looks like a common denominator. It is conceptual construction. Because now, let’s look at it this way. In fact, I am now taking not the common denominator, which is “your property and your safeguarding”—after all, how did we derive the common denominator there? I said there is fire and pit; what is the common denominator between them? That it is my property and its safeguarding is my responsibility, right? And “his stone, his knife, and his burden” too is my property and its safeguarding is my responsibility, therefore one is liable. The Rosh is not built that way. In the Rosh, first of all, I impose liability because it is pit, not because it is my property and its safeguarding is my responsibility. It is not obligated at all because of the common denominator. It is obligated because of its similarity to pit. The only problem is that the wind was involved here. So fire shows that this is not a problem. That’s all. So I now take the aspect unique to fire—that wind is involved in it—and the aspect unique to pit—that it is something that causes damage when you walk over it in the public domain—and fuse them together in conceptual construction, not in a common denominator. And that is how I get the damage of “his stone, his knife, and his burden.” That is what the Rosh says; it is clear that this is what he says. In other words, it is not a common denominator, even though the Talmud itself says it is a common denominator, with all the formulation: “what about this, which…” The Talmud itself tries it there as a common denominator. By the way, the Talmud there does not conclude—I’ll look now, I’m just remembering—on page 6 there isn’t the… Usually in formulations of the common denominator, there is usually a concluding sentence: “and so the argument returns: this is not like that and that is not like this; the common denominator between them is that they are your property and their safeguarding is your responsibility,” etc., right? Let’s read the Talmud. I’m almost sure it doesn’t—just a second, I’ll open the Talmud just to be certain. Ah, exactly, look, I’ll read it to you. “Really, where he declared them ownerless, and they are not similar to pit. What can you say about pit? No other force is involved in it—will you say that about these, where another force is involved in them? Fire will prove it.” Up to this point it is very similar to the common denominator, right? “And what about fire, whose way is to move and cause damage? Pit will prove it. And so the argument returns, and so the argument returns.” Where is the official sentence that always ends the common denominator? “And so the argument returns: this is not like that and that is not like this; the common denominator between them is that they are your property and their safeguarding is your responsibility, and when they cause damage the damager is obligated”—the wording of the Mishnah itself, okay? “So too his stone, his knife, and his burden, which are your property and whose safeguarding is your responsibility, he is liable to pay.” None of this appears in the Talmud.

[Speaker B] Fine, we’d need to check how consistent that is.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] So I’m saying, I don’t think it’s consistent. There are places where they abbreviate a bit. I’m only saying that no objection will come from here. If the Talmud had formulated here the full formulation, I would have had a problem, because the full formulation says that you derive it from the common denominator, not from conceptual construction. I don’t think it’s consistent that in all places in the Talmud where they abbreviate, it will always be this case, although it’s worth checking. I haven’t checked. It needs to be checked. Okay, but I’m saying this is the source for the Rosh, that the Rosh explains here that this is not a common denominator at all. Everyone reads it as the common denominator, and all the rule-makers and the Atzmot Yosef here celebrates over the common denominator, and everyone. The Rosh says: this is not a common denominator at all; it is conceptual construction. Okay? And then the implication is immediate. Meaning, the laws that apply to “his stone, his knife, and his burden” are the laws of pit. It’s just pit. Fire only showed me that this is a legitimate pit; I need not be troubled by the fact that the wind was involved in it. Okay, so that’s regarding “his stone, his knife, and his burden” in damages. One second. Here. I’ll bring you an example of something similar. There is room to discuss two things. There is a Maimonides in the Laws of the Yom Kippur Service. In the Laws of the Yom Kippur Service, Maimonides writes that the additional offerings of Yom Kippur that falls on the Sabbath are offered by the High Priest. You know that sacrifices in the Temple are offered by any priest; the sacrifices of Yom Kippur are offered by the High Priest. Now if Yom Kippur falls on the Sabbath, then they bring all the sacrifices of the day, and besides that there are also the additional Sabbath offerings to bring. Maimonides says: the additional Sabbath offerings of that day too—

[Speaker B] are offered by the High Priest.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Okay? So the Or Sameach is puzzled there: what, why? After all, these are the offerings of an ordinary day, not of Yom Kippur. On a regular Sabbath, the additional offerings are brought by an ordinary priest, not the High Priest. So why, when Yom Kippur falls on the Sabbath, is the Sabbath aspect also offered by the High Priest? So the Or Sameach argues that when Yom Kippur falls on the Sabbath, in my language, it’s not a combination of Yom Kippur and Sabbath; it’s a day of a third type that has two aspects. It has lambs on the Sabbath axis, and it has the ram on the Yom Kippur axis, and this is really a day of a third type. But how do I know its laws? Its laws I have to derive from the laws of Sabbath and Yom Kippur, somehow combining them in order to understand the laws of this day. But in fact, on this day it could be that even the Sabbath aspect of the day is not an ordinary Sabbath. Because if I reached the conclusion that the offerings of such a day are brought by the High Priest, that means the Yom Kippur aspect is dominant and the Sabbath is recessive in this context, then I’m basically saying that the Sabbath offerings brought on that day will also be done by the High Priest. Because these are not Sabbath offerings; these are Yom Kippur offerings that occur on the Sabbath. And Yom Kippur that falls on the Sabbath is simply a kind of Yom Kippur. And just as a kind of Yom Kippur has to have its offerings brought by the High Priest, so too the additional Sabbath offerings brought that day are additional offerings of the Sabbath of Yom Kippur, not of an ordinary Sabbath. How do I know that I have to bring the additional Sabbath offerings? From the fact that on an ordinary Sabbath too they bring an additional offering—but that’s only my source. Do you understand? I learn from Sabbath and from Yom Kippur with its building blocks and its knife. Okay? It’s not a combination; it’s a fusion. It’s not two aspects, it’s not two laws where you have both Sabbath and Yom Kippur and I connect them to one another. I’m not connecting them; I’m merging them into one another. It becomes a third entity. What the Rogatchover calls this is a compositional fusion, not a neighborly composition. Meaning, a chemical composition and not a physical one, yes, that’s how we’d say it in modern language. When you just put the two things next to each other, only mixed together—that’s, yes, mixture and compound, exactly. That’s a kind of composition that doesn’t create something new, just two things dwelling next to each other. Neighbors. That’s neighborly composition. There’s compositional fusion, where the thing is blended. The two things fuse and become a third thing. Okay? Yom Kippur that falls on the Sabbath fuses and becomes a third day. It’s not a composition of Yom Kippur and Sabbath where they’re simply neighbors. Now they come together, a package deal of Yom Kippur plus Sabbath. No—it’s Yom Kippur that falls on the Sabbath. Once, in some interview in BeSheva, many years ago already, I told the reporter there that I am a religious secular Zionist. Because the Haredim are not Zionist, and the Religious Zionists—their Zionism is religious, whereas I am a religious person but my Zionism is secular. Meaning, in Religious Zionism, the hyphen—as Burg already said, Yosef Burg, Burg the father, yes—he said that in Religious Zionism, what defines it is neither the Zionism nor the religiosity, but the hyphen. It’s a joke, but it’s true, true—that’s the definition of Religious Zionism. Religious Zionism is a situation in which it’s not that you’re both Zionist and religious. That would be neighborly composition. Religious Zionism is compositional fusion, where your Zionism is religious. Meaning, it is a religious principle to be Zionist. Okay? That’s the point. And maybe there are also those who would say the opposite, that my religiosity is in a certain sense Zionist, but that can be discussed. But you understand: if someone is both Zionist and religious, he isn’t a Religious Zionist, because he has no hyphen. He is Zionist and he is religious. So that’s me. Meaning, I’m Zionist and religious, but not Zionist as a religious principle. I’m Zionist because I’m Zionist, like the joke about the Rabbi of Ponevezh, that on Independence Day he hung out a flag. After all, he was always fighting there with the students over the flag; there were always flag games every Yom Kippur. He would sit there every Independence Day on the roof and guard the flag so the students wouldn’t steal it. I heard from the journalist Dov Ganchovsky—he told me that he sat there with the Rabbi of Ponevezh on the roof and they studied together in order to guard the flag every Yom Kippur. He was his neighbor. So on the one hand, that’s on the one hand, and he also didn’t say supplication prayers that day. But he also didn’t say Hallel. And the famous joke is that they asked him: what’s the point? Either it’s a holiday, so say Hallel, or it’s not a holiday, so say supplication prayers. So he said: I’m no more Zionist than Ben-Gurion. Ben-Gurion also doesn’t say Hallel and doesn’t say supplication prayers. So neither do I. Now, you think that’s a joke—it’s not a joke, it’s a completely serious answer. What did he say? He said: I’m completely Zionist, but my Zionism is not religious. I’m Zionist like Ben-Gurion. That’s all, I’m not a Religious Zionist. So from my perspective this is not a religious holiday; I don’t say Hallel for it. I don’t say supplication prayers, just as I don’t say supplication prayers on any random day when a miracle happened to me, when something good happened to me. But that doesn’t make it something of religious value. So my Zionism is secular Zionism, and I’m a religious person—that’s what he said there. It’s obvious that that’s what he said there; it’s not a joke at all. It’s a completely serious answer. Everybody laughs so much; in Bnei Brak they were all so proud of that joke, how he took down the Mizrachi people and the… They’re talking nonsense. He was presenting there a non-Haredi view. People don’t understand what they’re saying. He wasn’t a Religious Zionist with a hyphen, but Zionist and religious without a hyphen. That’s the view he presented there. I think there are many like that, by the way; it’s just that because that option isn’t on the table of possibilities, people find themselves forced to position themselves as either Haredi or Religious Zionist. I think if this option were presented, a great many people would find that they really are there. Meaning, in my sentiment I’m completely Zionist, and my Zionism is like Ben-Gurion’s. I’m part of this people, I want to come back here, to live among my people. I don’t know whether this is the beginning of redemption and the other side and all sorts of concepts that nobody knows what they mean. I know that I want to be here, that’s all. There was Leibowitz once—I’m digressing a bit—but in the 1950s a group of journalists came here from abroad and interviewed intellectuals. They asked them, why are you here, why are you Zionist? So when they asked Leibowitz, he said: because he’s fed up with the gentile. That’s why I’m Zionist. Everyone gave answers like: we want to be a light unto the nations, to reestablish the Temple, to return—each one with his own thesis; there were secular people, there were religious people, all kinds of exalted theses. And Leibowitz said: I’m here because I’m fed up with the gentile. I’m tired of the gentile; I want to live with the Jews, my people, that’s all. That’s why I’m here. That’s exactly it. That’s secular Zionism. Meaning, I’m here for the same reason Ben-Gurion was here. Because I want to live here with my people, just as a Belgian wants to live with his people. Without any connection to Zionism and redemption, redemption and religious eschatology and all sorts of things of that kind. Maybe it will happen, maybe it won’t, I have no idea; God willing, let it happen. But that’s not what I’m building on. I have no idea what will be; I haven’t been behind the curtain. Okay. So what I just want to say is the same thing. Meaning, in Religious Zionism with a hyphen, that’s compositional fusion. The Zionism and the religiosity are melted together and create something new. It’s not a composition of Zionist plus religious, where he is both this and that. Neighborly composition is that I’m also Zionist and I’m also religious, but there’s no hyphen in the middle. I’m simply both, that’s all. By the way, the two laws of Rabbi Chaim are always neighborly composition. That’s how it is. There’s this side, and maidservant and free woman, half-maidservant—so from the side of half-maidservant she has this law, and from the side of half-free woman she has that law. That’s neighborly composition. Compositional fusion means that half-maidservant, half-free woman becomes a designated maidservant. And suddenly a new concept is born from that composition, and that concept has all sorts of laws, and then it basically becomes compositional fusion. Okay? And there are all sorts of such things in Jewish law. “The tam aspect remains in its place,” yes? You have an ox that gored three times. There’s a position in the Talmud that says half-damages remain intact. Right? Because a non-habitual ox pays half-damages; a habitual ox pays full damages from the fourth time onward. Okay, the question is whether half of the full damage has to be paid from the body of the ox. Because, after all, a non-habitual ox pays half-damages from the body of the ox. A habitual ox—the owner of a habitual ox—pays money. Okay, there’s an opinion in the Talmud that the tam aspect remains in its place. Meaning that a habitual ox pays half from its body, because all in all it’s a tam plus something else, but the tam aspect still exists in it even after it became habitual. Similarly, the Rogatchover in a responsum in Tzafnat Pa’aneach, responsa, section 2, speaks there about a Jewish holiday that falls on the Sabbath, somewhat similar to what the Or Sameach is doing here. A Jewish holiday that falls on the Sabbath—so he says, with a Jewish holiday that falls on the Sabbath, the question is what happens if someone cooked on that holiday. It’s forbidden, of course, right? On an ordinary holiday cooking is permitted; on Sabbath it is forbidden. What happens on a holiday that falls on the Sabbath? So everyone understands: from the Sabbath side it is forbidden, from the holiday side it is permitted, right? In the end, practically, it’s forbidden because it’s also Sabbath—but only from the Sabbath side. The Rogatchover raises the possibility there that he transgresses both Sabbath and holiday if he cooks in such a situation. A third concept, yes? Because a holiday that falls on the Sabbath is not a neighborly composition of holiday and Sabbath, so from the Sabbath side you’re liable and from the holiday side you’re… there are no longer sides. The sides got mixed and fused into a third kind of day, as we saw here with Yom Kippur that falls on the Sabbath. And now if you’re liable, you’re liable from all the aspects; there’s no separation of aspects—they’ve been melted into one thing. Okay, similarly he discusses there—maybe it appears in that same responsum or somewhere else, I don’t remember—whether the High Priest has within him an aspect of an ordinary priest. If there are things forbidden to an ordinary priest but permitted to a High Priest for some reason, then the question is whether, when he is a High Priest—or even if it’s not like that at all—if a High Priest marries a divorced woman, how many prohibitions does he violate? Does he violate the prohibition of an ordinary priest marrying a divorced woman plus the prohibition of a High Priest marrying a divorced woman, because all in all the High Priest is also an ordinary priest, just an upgraded ordinary priest? Just as every Jew is a gentile plus one more level. We talked about this once, right? What’s the difference between a gentile and a complete gentile? I think I mentioned this. You don’t know the difference between a gentile and a complete gentile? A complete gentile is only a Jew. Have you ever heard people say about a gentile that he’s a complete gentile? They only say that about a Jew: he’s a complete gentile. Right, a complete gentile is only a Jew. What does it mean that a complete gentile is a Jew? It means that in this Jew, the gentile aspect has taken over all of him. He’s not half-gentile with an extra Jewish level on top of it; he’s entirely gentile, a complete gentile. What is an ordinary Jew? An ordinary Jew is half-gentile, a huge and mighty gentile. Meaning he’s a gentile plus an additional level, the Jewish level, but obviously everything that applies to a gentile applies to him as well. Nothing human is foreign to me, yes? As Cicero said, I think. What?

[Speaker D] Is there a halakhic problem, halakhic points in that level that you can… like… I think there isn’t.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, there’s the convulsing animal, but that’s a few very specific examples; Rabbi Kook talks about it. But he argues that it doesn’t… I once wrote a long article about this. It doesn’t interfere; meaning, it can be explained. So all these things basically say that very often we take two halakhic concepts and fuse them together, and that fusion creates or constructs—this is conceptual construction—it creates or constructs a new concept. You take aspects from this, aspects from that, fuse them together, and create a new concept. That’s basically what we did here in the conceptual construction, the dual picture of the common denominator. By the way, parenthetically, the Or Sameach, for example, draws a halakhic conclusion from this Maimonides about the additional offerings of Yom Kippur that falls on the Sabbath. What happens with a sick person who eats on Yom Kippur that falls on the Sabbath? The question is whether he has to recite kiddush. There’s a famous story about the Avnei Nezer when he was a child. His father sent him to eat; he was a small child, and his father sent him to eat. He came back to the synagogue, and his father said to him: tell me, did you recite kiddush? He said: of course not. He said to him: why not? It’s a holiday; you ate on a holiday, you’re not obligated to fast, you’re a child, you ate and it’s a holiday, why didn’t you recite kiddush? The Avnei Nezer said to him: what do you mean? My whole obligation as a child to recite kiddush is because of education, right? Education means to know what to do when I become an adult—that’s called education. But when I become an adult I won’t have to recite kiddush, so I have no obligation to recite kiddush even as a child. He was a sharp fellow. That’s on ordinary Yom Kippur, but most of the later authorities say that on ordinary Yom Kippur kiddush is not relevant at all. But what about Yom Kippur that falls on the Sabbath? On Yom Kippur that falls on the Sabbath, from the side of Sabbath you need to recite kiddush. Now if there’s a sick person who needs to eat, then there is no commandment upon him to fast; quite the opposite, there is a commandment upon him to eat—“you shall greatly guard your lives.” So he eats, and it’s Sabbath, so why doesn’t he recite kiddush? So indeed there are those who say that he must recite kiddush. And the Or Sameach wants to argue that he does not need to recite kiddush, from this Maimonides. Since Yom Kippur that falls on the Sabbath is a new day. It’s a special type of Yom Kippur. It’s not a composition of Yom Kippur plus Sabbath, such that from the Sabbath side he would be obligated to recite kiddush and from the Yom Kippur side he would not need to recite kiddush. So practically he should recite kiddush because the Sabbath side is also here. He says no—Yom Kippur that falls on the Sabbath is a day of a third type. And if we really decided that in the end this thing is in essence Yom Kippur, then it is a special kind of Yom Kippur, and on Yom Kippur one does not recite kiddush. So there is no longer a Sabbath side that would require me to recite kiddush. There are no sides; it’s been fused. Yes, it’s a compound, not a mixture. So all these examples are really exactly examples that reflect what compositional fusion is, yes, as opposed to neighborly composition, or what I called here conceptual construction. Compositional fusion of two concepts means pouring them together or merging them into a third concept, or merging parts of them. Sometimes it’s a more complicated intellectual process; you don’t merge both of them as is, but rather you take one facet from here, one facet from there, and build from them a third concept. Not a composition of both together, but rather you take materials from here, materials from there, assemble them together, create from that some kind of third concept, and this thing is called conceptual construction. This is basically another kind of interpretive principle, as I said earlier. Now I want to show you—I’m not going to have time now, I see. Fine, I’ll bring it next time, because this is a long topic and I won’t manage. So next time what I want to do is two examples—or from next time, I don’t know if I’ll get through everything—two examples of conceptual construction. One example is in the laws of oaths, and again all the later authorities get stuck with all kinds of difficulties and understandings and so on, and in my opinion it’s all simple and clear. It’s simply conceptual construction. People don’t understand, they’re not aware, that there is another kind of inference here or another kind of intellectual work—an intellectual synthesis, really. And the second kind is a topic in tractate Kiddushin about the law of a Canaanite slave and the law of a guarantor, where it connects various forms of acquisition. You pay on my behalf and I acquire, or I—or he—pays you and that’s how I acquire from him, and all the combinations among three people. And there too you can see that there is really almost a theory of combinations there. What happens there is conceptual construction. So these are the two examples I’ll want to do from next time onward. What? Why nine and two? Nine and two—but that’s not a composition. What?

[Speaker B] There’s Hanukkah candle-lighting, after all.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I don’t know whenever it will be, I don’t remember. I think not; I think the university ends at four, doesn’t it? I think so. So next week there won’t be; it’ll be in another two weeks.

[Speaker B] I assume so because you need to light candles. Four-oh-three? It’s dark now at four-oh-three. No, the sun runs off early.