Q&A: I would be very happy if his honor, the great gaon, may he live long, would answer us…
I would be very happy if his honor, the great gaon, may he live long, would answer us…
Question
“And they shall take to you a red heifer without blemish” (19:2), and later on (verse 22) Rashi brings, based on the teaching of Rabbi Moshe the Preacher: the red heifer is like the case of a maidservant’s son who dirtied the king’s palace; they said, let his mother come and clean up the filth. So too, let the heifer come and atone for the calf. But in Moed Katan (28a; brought by Rashi later on 20:1) it says: why was the section about Miriam’s death placed next to the section of the red heifer? To tell you that just as the red heifer atones, so too the death of the righteous atones.
Tosafot explain (there, s.v. “just as”): the red heifer atones for the sin of the calf, as we say in the midrash, by the parable of the maidservant’s son who dirtied, etc. But this requires investigation, for we derive in Yoma (2a) from the verse about the inauguration offerings, “As has been done on this day, the Lord commanded to do, to atone for you,” that both the High Priest before Yom Kippur and the priest who burns the heifer are separated for seven days beforehand into a chamber in the Temple. And the Gemara says: granted, the whole verse cannot be interpreted about the heifer, because it says “to atone,” and the heifer is not for atonement. So it is explicit that the heifer does not come for atonement, and this is very difficult.
Also, it says in Gittin (60a) that eight sections were said on the day the Tabernacle was erected, including the section of the red heifer. And Rashi explains: because on the next day the heifer was burned so that they could be purified for their Passover offerings. This needs explanation: why does Rashi say specifically that they would be purified for their Passover offerings? Let him simply say it was because of the purification of the Levites, for the verse says (Numbers 8:7), “Sprinkle on them water of purification.” And see Rashi on Parashat Naso (7:1, s.v. “on the day Moses finished”), where he writes: it was on the New Moon of Nisan; on the second day the heifer was burned, on the third they performed the first sprinkling, and on the seventh they shaved.
It follows from this that the sprinkling for the Levites took place a considerable time before the bringing of the Passover offering. If so, it is again difficult: why did Rashi specifically mention Passover? [And this requires further investigation: was the section of corpse-impurity said before the section of the red heifer was said? See Sukkah 25b, and the novellae of Rabbi Yitzchak Zev HaLevi on Parashat Beha’alotekha, and Midrash Tanchuma Chukat, end of sec. 6. Consider this carefully.]
Answer
The heifer comes to purify the impure, not for atonement. In other words: the red heifer is not a sacrifice. In terms of the reason for the verse, it comes to atone for the sin of the calf (= that is why they specifically chose the mechanism of a heifer to purify those who became impure through a corpse, rather than a rooster or a lamb).
There are eight sections that were said on that day, and one of them is the section of the Levites (and Rashi explains: on that day they were needed for song). And what is the verse there? “Take the Levites from among the children of Israel and purify them.” So the purification of the Levites is already stated, and that is why he mentioned the Passover offerings. Also, the Passover offerings were a need of all Israel, not just the Levites.
Discussion on Answer
I don’t know why this trick is preferable to the simple answer that he becomes pure at sunset.
And I also thought that if the inner vessel is not pure, then the water itself becomes impure by the law of liquid impurity, and not because it is purification water. So it would again make the pure priest impure.
“You shall blot out the memory of Amalek from under the heavens; do not forget” (25:19). “Blot out the memory of Amalek”—from man to woman, from infant to suckling, from ox to sheep, so that the name of Amalek should not be mentioned even in connection with an animal, as in: ‘this animal belonged to Amalek’ (Rashi). The Minchat Chinukh (commandment 604) cites Rashi’s wording and writes: this matter—that even the animals must be killed—is not explained in Maimonides or Sefer HaChinukh, and I do not know where Rashi derived it from, etc. And from the episode of Saul [who was commanded through Samuel to kill even the animals (I Samuel 15:3)] there is no proof, because there the Holy One commanded him then through Samuel, but that this is an ongoing commandment for future generations—we have not heard that, end quote.
However, we do find a source for Rashi in Eichah Rabbah (end of chapter 3): “Jeremiah said, ‘You shall pursue them in anger and destroy them’ (Lamentations 3:66), and Moses said, ‘For I will surely blot out the memory of Amalek from under the heavens’ (Exodus 17:14) … ‘from under the heavens’—so that people will not say, ‘this tree is Amalek’s, this camel is Amalek’s, this ewe is Amalek’s.’” So it is clear that there is a commandment to blot out even Amalek’s animals, just as Rashi wrote.
But this is difficult from what is written (I Samuel 27:8–9): “And David and his men went up and raided the Geshurites, the Girzites, and the Amalekites … and he took sheep, cattle, donkeys, camels, and garments.”
It is explicit in the verse that David took Amalek’s animals and did not kill them.
And it is even more difficult from what is written (I Chronicles 18:11): “King David also dedicated these to the Lord, together with the silver and the gold that he had taken from all the nations—from Edom, Moab, the children of Ammon, the Philistines, and Amalek.” So David clearly did not refrain from taking the silver and gold that he had taken from Amalek, and did not destroy them from under the heavens; more than that, he dedicated them to Heaven and established them in the Temple. (See the responsa Oneg Yom Tov, introduction, letter v, in the gloss.)
Another difficulty on the same topic: Jewish custom is to write the name Amalek under the shoe and blot out his name. The source of this custom is in Orchot Chaim of Lunel (laws of Purim, sec. 41), who brings the custom in Provence and France that boys would take smooth stones and write “Haman” on them, and strike them against one another, based on the verse “the name of the wicked shall rot,” and the verse “for I will surely blot out the memory of Amalek.” [And so too in Sefer HaMinhagim (laws of Megillah, sec. 18) and in Sefer Yesod Yosef (chapter 82); and see the book Sichot Chafetz Chaim, vol. 2, p. 71, which reports that this was also the custom of the Chafetz Chaim.]
Seemingly, its point is because of the commandment “you shall blot out the memory of Amalek” [as implied by the wording of Orchot Chaim and as also seems from the Rema (Orach Chaim 690:17)].
But this is puzzling: the commandment of blotting out Amalek obligates one to kill him and eradicate him from the world, so how can one fulfill the commandment of erasing him merely by erasing his name?
And even more puzzling: what kind of erasure is this, after all, if he himself created it and brought it into the world? Before writing it, his name was not mentioned at all; he wrote it, and then as soon as he wrote it he erased it, merely returning it to its previous state. [Consider carefully the wording of Maimonides in Sefer HaMitzvot, positive commandment 189, on the foundation of the commandment to remember Amalek.]
It may be that once they bought or dedicated Amalek’s property, it was no longer Amalek’s animal but Israel’s animal. The assumption is that the obligation of destruction is not on the object itself, but that no property of Amalek should remain in the world. (That is what Rashi means when he says that the name of Amalek would be attached to it. Though according to this, Rashi should read “this animal belongs to Amalek” and not “this animal belonged to Amalek.” And that is indeed the version in the midrash of Eichah Rabbah that you cited: “belongs to Amalek,” nothing more.)
The custom of blotting out Amalek’s name on shoes is of course not a fulfillment of the commandment to blot out Amalek, but some sort of remembrance of a commandment that no longer applies (and look carefully at Maimonides, positive commandment 187). Just as reading Zakhor is not blotting out Amalek, but remembering him.
I’m sending the Rabbi all of our difficulties; we’d be very happy if he would answer…
“And whoever touches the water of sprinkling shall be impure until evening” (19:21). Rabbi Akiva’s view is that just as one who touches the water of purification becomes first-degree impure, so too a pure person upon whom the water of purification was sprinkled becomes first-degree impure [unlike the view of the Sages; see there]. On the other hand, in Yoma (8a) it is explained that the High Priest is separated for seven days before Yom Kippur, and they sprinkle water of purification on him every day, merely as an added stringency so that he will certainly be pure for the Yom Kippur service. Yet he would still perform the Temple service every day, and they were not concerned that perhaps he was impure and therefore disqualified from the service, because by the basic law he is pure.
And it is said there (14a) that this ruling is not in accordance with Rabbi Akiva, for according to Rabbi Akiva the High Priest becomes impure through the sprinkling of the purification water. And Abaye says that it can work even according to Rabbi Akiva, because they would sprinkle on him after the service, at the end of the day before sunset, and he would immerse immediately and become pure at sunset.
But this requires investigation in light of what we rule (Chagigah 22a; Shulchan Arukh Yoreh De’ah 201:9): if one put impure vessels into a large vessel and immersed them, it depends—if the large vessel was impure, then even if its opening was extremely narrow, the immersion counts for the vessels inside it, because since the immersion works for the large vessel, it works for the vessels inside it as well. But if the large vessel was pure, the immersion does not count for the vessels inside it unless the opening of the large vessel is wide enough like the mouth of a wineskin tube.
Accordingly, why is it necessary to do the sprinkling close to sunset and only after the service? They could also sprinkle before the service, because there is a simple solution: take an impure vessel inside a large pure vessel, where the opening of the larger one is not wide enough like the mouth of a wineskin tube. The law is that if the large vessel is pure, the immersion does not help the inner one, but if the large vessel is impure, the immersion helps them all. Now let the High Priest touch the large pure vessel and afterward immerse the vessel.
And now, either way: if the High Priest is impure with corpse-impurity, then he rendered the large vessel impure, and both vessels became pure through immersion. But if he is pure, then the large vessel did not become impure, and therefore the inner one remains impure. Now let them place the water of purification into the inner vessel and sprinkle. For either way, if the High Priest is impure and needs sprinkling, then as stated the inner vessel became pure along with the large vessel through their joint immersion, and therefore the purification water inside it did not become impure, and thus the High Priest is properly purified through this sprinkling. But if in fact we assume that the High Priest is pure, since he is performing the service, then he did not render the large vessel impure by touching it, and it follows that the inner vessel remained impure; and thus the purification water placed in it was invalidated, and if so it does not impart impurity at all through its sprinkling.