Question

Rava said: If he bound him and he died of hunger, he is exempt. And Rava said: If he bound him in the sun and he died, or in the cold and he died, he is liable. If the sun was eventually going to come, or the cold was eventually going to come, he is exempt. And Rava said: If he bound him before a lion, he is exempt; before mosquitoes, he is liable. Rav Ashi said: Even before mosquitoes too he is exempt, because these go away and those come. It was also stated: If one overturned a barrel over him and spread plaster over it, Rava and Rabbi Zeira disagreed; one said liable and one said exempt. It may be concluded that Rava is the one who said exempt, for Rava said: If he bound him and he died of hunger, he is exempt. On the contrary, it may be concluded that Rabbi Zeira is the one who said exempt, for Rabbi Zeira said: If someone brought another person into a marble house and lit a lamp for him and he died, he is liable. The reason is that he lit a lamp for him; if he had not lit a lamp for him, he would not be liable. They said: There, without the lamp, the vapor does not begin immediately; here, even without the lamp, the vapor begins immediately.
I would like help understanding these statements in light of what we know about the laws of physics and biology, and to try to understand the Talmud according to their concepts in these matters.
Now according to what we know, there is no difference at all between “he bound him and he died of hunger” and “he bound him in the sun and he died.”
According to the ancient understanding, the sun itself is a harmful thing, and therefore since the damaging agent is already present he is liable; whereas in the case of dying of hunger, even if he was already hungry, he is exempt, as Tosafot wrote on the phrase “he bound him and he died of hunger” — even if he was already hungry at the time he bound him, since if the hunger had not intensified he would not have died, this is considered “the hunger is yet to come,” unlike one who bound him in the sun, where the sun has already fallen upon him in a way fit to cause death.
But according to our understanding, the sun is only a factor causing a person to die from heatstroke and dehydration, exactly in the same way that he dies from hunger, and I cannot distinguish between the two.
Further on: “If someone brought another person into a marble house and lit a lamp for him and he died, he is liable. The reason is that he lit a lamp for him; if he had not lit a lamp for him, he would not be liable. They said: There, without the lamp, the vapor does not begin immediately; here, even without the lamp, the vapor begins immediately.”
Here too it is hard to understand what the difference is between overturning a barrel over him and a marble house, and why in the marble house, if he did not light the lamp, he would be exempt. In both cases he is only causing a lack of oxygen, and the whole difference is only quantitative and not qualitative in the causation. It may be possible to explain that when it is not noticeable that this is the cause, because it will take a long time for the oxygen to run out, that is different from a barrel, where his force is more evident in the result. (According to this, someone who on the Sabbath closes the valve of a gas flame from far away from the flame, so that it is not noticeable that he caused the extinguishing, would be different from a case where the flame is close to the gas valve that he is closing; and perhaps on a Jewish holiday this would even be explicitly permitted, since it would be only indirect extinguishing.)
And of course the Sages did not understand the cause of death as resulting from lack of oxygen, but rather that he died from the vapor coming out of his mouth, which had nowhere to go. Therefore in the barrel the vapor starts acting immediately, whereas in the marble house it does not start immediately unless he lit the lamp. But here too it is hard to understand, because this too is only a quantitative issue and not a qualitative one.
Further on: “And Rava said: If one shot an arrow at him, and healing remedies were in his hand, and another came and scattered them — and even if he himself went first and scattered them — he is exempt, because at the moment he shot him, he could have been healed. Rav Ashi said: Therefore, even if remedies were available in the market. Rav Acha son of Rava said to Rav Ashi: What if remedies happened to become available to him? He said to him: He has already left the court acquitted.”
According to this, nowadays, whenever a murderer acts in a place where there is a hospital and a nearby emergency room where the victim’s life could be saved, he would not be liable to execution. And this could be good, as practical Jewish law in messianic times, in order not to impose the death penalty, in line with what the Talmud says in Makkot 7: “Had we been in the Sanhedrin, no person would ever have been executed.” See there.
Further on: “And Rava said: If he threw a pebble at a wall and it rebounded backward and killed, he is liable.” And Rashi explains: “If he threw a pebble at a wall” — and intended to kill his fellow, and he threw a pebble and it struck the wall with force and rebounded backward by his force and killed him — he is liable, for this too is his force. One should understand, according to Newton’s laws, whether the opposite force exerted by the wall is indeed considered his force.
Further on: “And Rav Pappa said: If he threw a pebble upward and it went sideways and killed, he is liable. Mar bar Rav Ashi said to Rav Pappa: What is the reason? Because it is his force? If it is his force, let it go upward; and if it is not his force, let it go downward. Rather, it is weakened force.”
And Rashi explains: “And it went sideways” — in the course of its fall, meaning that it did not fall straight opposite him, but when it returned to the ground it was moving off to the side. But if it fell directly in front of him and killed, he is exempt, because that is not his force; rather, it returns to the ground on its own. “Let it go upward” — for after all, he threw it upward, straight opposite him, not sideways. “And if it is not his force, let it go downward” — it should fall immediately straight down opposite itself, not to the side. “Rather, it is weakened force” — it is not his strong force, but there is still some of his force here. And the reason it does not continue upward is that the strength of the throw has been exhausted and the stone returns to the ground, but it still proceeds through some remnant of his force.
Here too one should consider that in fact two forces act on the stone: the force of the thrower upward, and gravity pulling downward, and those two forces together cause the sideways motion.