Q&A: The Main Part of an Act Is at Its Beginning
The Main Part of an Act Is at Its Beginning
Question
Hello Rabbi,
Recently I came across several topics in which a similar principle seems to recur, namely that the main part of something is at its beginning. For example:
- Regarding mentioning the special occasion in grace after meals, what determines it is the time the meal began.
- Regarding meeting the time limits for Shema and prayer, what determines it is the time one begins the prayer and Shema, not the time one finishes.
- Intention at the beginning of the Amidah prayer is indispensable (in the blessing of the Patriarchs), whereas later in the prayer it is not indispensable.
- Intention at the beginning of blessings over enjoyment is indispensable, whereas the conclusion of the blessing is not. For example, if someone is holding a cup of beer in his hand and recited the blessing thinking it was wine, and in the middle realized his mistake and therefore concluded, “by whose word all things came to be” — according to the Shulchan Arukh and Maimonides he has not fulfilled his obligation, whereas if at the beginning of the blessing he intended to say “by whose word all things came to be” and at the end concluded with the blessing for wine, he has fulfilled it (to the best of my recollection). That is, what matters is the beginning of the blessing, not its end.
- If it begins with negligence and ends with an accident beyond one’s control, it is considered negligence (and he is liable), whereas if it begins with an accident beyond one’s control and ends willingly, he is exempt. In other words, in both of these cases the law is determined by the beginning and not by the end.
- At the beginning of tractate Gittin there is a dispute whether the exposition of “and he shall write for her” — for her sake — refers to the writing of the bill of divorce or to the signing of it (that is, whether the essence of the bill of divorce is in its writing or in its signing). In practice, I saw that Maimonides rules that the essence of the bill of divorce is in its writing (that is, at its beginning and not at its end), and the exposition of “and he shall write for her” refers only to the writing of the bill of divorce.
Can one infer from these examples that they are based on a rule that the essence of an act lies in its beginning? And if so, could one then apply this rule inductively to other cases that have not been ruled on / resolved?
Answer
Hello Oren.
In my opinion there is no way to learn that from this. First of all, there are counterexamples. For example, “a thing is called only after its end / after the one who completes it.” One who writes a single letter at the completion of a scroll is considered to have written on the Sabbath (even though ordinarily two letters are required), and if ten people sat on a bench and damaged it, the last one is liable. And I’m sure there are many more.
But even without counterexamples, I don’t believe in such sweeping and unfocused generalizations. In each such case there are specific considerations for preferring the beginning, and therefore every other halakhic context has to be examined on its own merits.
Discussion on Answer
The book Etvan DeOraita tried to make rules out of all kinds of recurring patterns, and it has dozens of topics and medieval authorities in every direction, and in the end it all turns into one big salad. (In siman 9 he has an inquiry whether it is harder to uproot something that has already taken effect than to prevent it from taking effect in the first place, and he brings about twenty proofs for each side.) Which means that usually it’s better to try to understand each case on its own, and only afterward extract rules. Someone who learns by way of headings — whether we go after potential or actualization, etc. etc. — ends up with one giant pile of gibberish.
That is indeed correct. The Talmud itself treats rules with a certain degree of disdain. Each case on its own merits.
On the other hand, methods of exposition such as binyan av and kal va-chomer are built on generalizations. So why shouldn’t we use similar tools — generalizations — on Talmudic / halakhic topics?
You can use generalizations, but with caution. Even in the interpretive principles, those rules conceal many different shades depending on each case.
Following up on this, I came across a Wikipedia entry on the Brisker method where it says something relevant here:
"The Brisker method is based on an attempt to understand the rules of the topic, its foundations, and its definition, מתוך the topic itself. In this way, the details of the topic produce an inductive conclusion, which from that point on can be applied deductively to other topics in the Talmud."
Leaving that aside, there is another proof in favor of the idea that the beginning of an act is its main part:
Maimonides, Laws of Forbidden Sexual Relations, chapter 1, law 10:
"One who inserts only the crown of the organ is called ‘ma'areh,’ from the expression ‘he laid bare her source,’ and one who inserts the entire organ is called ‘one who completes the act.’ And regarding all forbidden sexual relations, both one who merely begins penetration and one who completes it are alike; even though he did not emit semen, and even though he withdrew and did not complete the act, once he inserted the crown of the organ both of them become liable to death by the religious court, or karet, or lashes, or disciplinary lashes. And whether one has intercourse with a forbidden relation in the usual manner or in an unusual manner, from the moment he begins penetration both of them become liable to death or karet or lashes or disciplinary lashes, whether they were lying down or standing — liability depends on the insertion of the crown of the organ."
That is, the beginning of the sexual act is enough to incur liability.
I don’t understand why this paragraph is relevant to our discussion here. Of course conclusions can be drawn from one place to another, but a generalization on such a broad and abstract issue (whether in Jewish law everything goes after the beginning) on the basis of a few examples does not seem reasonable to me. By the way, I don’t agree with that description of Brisker learning. Not at all.
As for your additional proof, what would you say about the dispute between Rabbi Yohanan and Reish Lakish regarding prohibitions of benefit — whether this is benefit to the throat or to the intestines? By the way, there are many more proofs (and also proofs to the contrary) — such as “part of the day is considered like the whole of it,” and so on. And still, as I wrote, such a generalization does not seem reasonable to me.
It may be that the generalization needs to be focused into something more specific. But it seems to me that there is something common to all these examples (even if there are counterexamples). Maybe in the future I’ll manage to sharpen this rule more.
As for the dispute between Rabbi Yohanan and Reish Lakish, I don’t think it is similar to the examples above, because the throat is not necessarily considered the beginning of the benefit, since one can, for example, feed someone through a tube, in which case only his intestines benefit. The rule that recurs in the examples is that when there is an act composed of the beginning of an act and the end of an act (like the beginning of a meal and the end of a meal), then from a halakhic standpoint what determines it is the beginning of the act (which reminds me of the saying, “the end of the act lies in the initial thought”). So דווקא the example of “part of the day is considered like the whole of it” may be similar in form, but still differs from the other examples because there is no human act here.
I came across two more examples for the collection:
In Bava Batra 149a: if a convert impregnated a woman before he converted, and his son was born after he converted, we go after the beginning of the act, and his son is not considered his son and does not inherit him.
In Sabbath 3a Rashi mentions that his teachers held that for counting the rabbinic prohibitions in the first Mishnah, one counts only the beginnings of the acts of transfer (that is, only the acts of lifting up). Here is his wording:
"And our rabbis say: stretching out a hand inside [for both of them], whether full or empty, is the beginning of the act, and that is what the Mishnah counts, so that there are two for the poor person and two for the homeowner."
Regarding the convert who converted, it could be that this isn’t considered the beginning of the act,
since the status of father applies only at the time of the act.
Conception is the moment of creation, and therefore it is what determines it. It is not because conception came first or was first. The birth that takes place after conversion does not determine it, not because it is second and later, but because the fetus already exists. In that sense, of course the beginning determines it.
One could have brought a proof from migo de-itkatzai, that the beginning of the Sabbath determines the status for the whole of it. But there too there is a specific reason for it (according to most medieval and later authorities, whatever was not prepared before the Sabbath is not considered prepared, and naturally that is measured at the beginning of the Sabbath. Elsewhere I proved that there are medieval and later authorities who have a different approach here, and it is explicit in the responsa Eretz Tzvi, that if it touches one moment of the Sabbath it is seized for the entire Sabbath. And this has a practical difference for migo de-itkatzai because of the previous day). See here (and also interesting responses in the next issue of HaMaayan):
Now I am reminded of the topic of “bata me-ikara” or “batar tevar mana” in Bava Kamma (end of the first chapter and beginning of the second). There a possibility is raised of going after the end, and there are cases in which it is clear that we do go after the end. And again, I would not derive a sweeping rule from here. Maybe there is room for formulating a more moderate rule.
In general, is it correct to try to identify abstract patterns that recur in different Talmudic topics and infer from that that we are dealing with a rule (induction), and then apply it deductively to other topics?