Q&A: Tractate Sanhedrin
Tractate Sanhedrin
Question
Rabbi Michi, hello!
With your permission, I wanted to ask a few questions about page 73a of tractate Sanhedrin.
1. The Talmud brings a Tosefta with additional cases that do not appear in the Mishnah, in which one may save them even at the cost of the pursuer’s life: those liable to karet and those liable to execution by the religious court. I checked and saw that there are transgressions that appear in both the category of karet liability and the category of court-imposed death penalty.
For example, one who has relations with an animal or one who has relations with his mother appears in both categories, according to what I found online.
2. Later on the page a Tosefta is brought: our Rabbis taught that if a priest is pursuing a widow, there is no obligation to save her from rape. This is a bit puzzling—just because it is defined as a prohibition, am I not obligated to save the woman from rape? Is that what our holy Torah holds?
3. There is a discussion in Tosafot whether the whole purpose of intervening is to save the pursuer from transgression or to save the pursued person from death. Seemingly, from the case of a High Priest who wants to rape a widow, where there is no obligation to save her, this seems to be proof that the whole purpose of intervention is only to save him from transgression. Do you think this is a valid proof?
Answer
- I didn’t understand the question. For these transgressions one is liable to execution by the religious court only when there are witnesses and prior warning. But if there are no witnesses and no prior warning, then one is liable to karet for them. Either way, one saves her/him at the cost of his life.
- In the law of a pursuer, the rescue is not from the rape but from the transgression. Even when the pursued person is rescued, this is presented as a permission because of the violation done to her, not because of her suffering. By the way, sometimes the wording in the passage is that we save him (we kill him in order to save him from his transgression) and not her. This really does run against the moral intuition. Maybe the point is that from a transgression there is an obligation to save even if the pursued person does not object. But if she does object, then every pursued person is saved (see the first Tosafot on that page there: “when she is not particular about her violation”).
- Seemingly yes. A proof is also brought there from one who pursues an animal.
Discussion on Answer
The violation is that she becomes less desirable merchandise on the marriage market. That is not necessarily proportional to the suffering involved in the rape.
Thanks again, one last question.
The Talmud does not speak at all about the rape of an unmarried virgin. There, it seems to me, the punishment is monetary payment. So in such a case there is violation, but the prohibition is less severe. Is it less severe than a priest who comes to rape a widow, where he is liable to lashes?
Another question.
Rashi writes regarding a priest who has relations with a widow that the violation is: “because he makes her a challalah.” What does that mean? Does it refer to the widow or to the child born from the forbidden union?
The violation in a virgin and in a non-virgin is different; there are violations that stem from the transgression itself (such as a widow to a High Priest or a forbidden relative).
Making her into a challalah is a violation because of the children who will be born to her and also because she becomes forbidden to a priest.
How can one know that a person running after a forbidden sexual partner is a pursuer in order to rape her?
From the context. From body language. There’s no choice, because there is no mathematical criterion.
Thank you very much.
What does it mean that the issue is her violation and not what she suffers? What kind of violation is being discussed—spiritual? Does the type of violation change depending on the type of rape victim?