Babylonian Talmud

Rodkinson 1918 — source 17, scan section 27

exterior he-goat propitiates only where there was one knowing, so propitiates the interior one, only where one knowing took 3 4 THE BABYLONIAN TALMUD. place. But wliere there was no knowledge either before or after, the propitiation is efifected by the he-goats sacrificed on (the) holidays and new-moon days. So R. Jehudah ; R. Simeon, however, says: The he-goats of the holidays atone, but not those of the new-moon days, which propitiate only him who ate something polluted while being himself clean. R. Mair says: All goat sacrifices are equivalent as to propitiating (the) pollu- tion of the holy temple and its holy sacrifice. R. Simeon would say: The he-goats of the new-moon days propitiate for the clean who ate something polluted; those of the holidays, for cases where there was no knowing either before or after; and that of the day of atonement, for cases where there is no antecedent but a subsequent knowing. And when he was asked : May one of them be sacrificed instead of the other? he answered: Aye! Whereupon they retorted : Since they are not all equivalent as to their capacity of propitiating, how can they substitute one an- other? To which he replied : They all possess this in common that they propitiate for polluting the holy temple and its offerings. R. Simeon b. Jehudah, however, said in his name: The he-goats of the new-moon days propitiate for a clean one who has eaten defiled food; those of the holidays possess a greater power, as they propitiate for the clean who has eaten defiled, and for the case of polluting where there was neither antecedent nor subse- quent knowledge; those of the day of atonement are superior to the others in that they propitiate not only for the clean one who has received defiled food and for the case of neither ante- cedent nor subsequent knowledge, but also for the case where there is no antecedent but a subsequent knowledge. Hereupon he was questioned: May the one he-goat be offered as substitute for the other? And he answered : Yea. To which the others re- joined : It may be admitted that the goats of the day of atone- ment be ofTered on the new-moon days, but how can the reverse take place, i.e., that the goats of the new-moon days propitiate for what they are not capable of doing? And his answer was: They all have this in common that they propitiate defilement of the holy temple and of its holy viands. For wanton pollution of the holy temple and of its holy offerings the interior he-goat of the day of atonement as well as this day itself atones for all other transgressions of the Law both lenient and rigorous, intentional and unintentional, the foreknown and unforcknown, the positive and negative command- ments, those entailing koreth or judicial death-punishment, for TRACT SHEBUOTH (OATHS). 5 all these the exported goat atones. Herein are equal Israelites, priests, and the anointed high-priest. What difference does, then, exist between Israelite and priest and anointed high- priest? That the blood of the bullock propitiates for the pollu- tion of the sanctuary and of the holy viands by the priests. R. Simeon, however, says : Even as the blood of the goat prepared in the interior propitiates for the Israelites, so does the blood of the bullock for the priest ; even as the confession of sins over the kid to be exported propitiates for the Israelite, so does the confession of sins over the bullock propitiate for the priest. GEMARA: Let us see in accordance with whom is our Mishna's statement. It is not in accordance with R. Ismael and also not with R. Aqiba, as according to the former, one is not liable to a sin-offering, only if the oath concerns the future (this is explained in Chap. III. of this tract), and according to the latter, one is liable only for forgetting that the object is defiled, but not if he forgot that this is the sanctuary? The Mishna can be explained in accordance with both. With R. Ismael, as he may say that the expression of the Mishna, two subdivided into four, means that for some of them one is liable, and for some of them one is not. The same can be said con- cerning R. Aqiba. But how can R. Aqiba's statement be ex- plained so? Does not the Mishna include leprosy in which there is not a single case for which one is not liable to a sin- offering, consequently all the cases mentioned in the Mishna are of the same kind? We must, therefore, say that it is in accordance with R. Ismael only, and to the question that R. Ismael does not make one liable for the past, it may be answered that he frees him from the liability of a sin-offering only, but not from the punishment of stripes, as he holds that stripes apply even to such a negative command in which there is no manual labor, and this is, as Rabha explained elsewhere (Chap. III.), that such is R. Ismael's opinion. But if so, then R. Johanan's statements would contradict each other — namely, at one place he declared that the Halakha prevails according to an anonymous Mishna (our Mishna, which is anonymous, and is in accordance with R. Ismael), and elsewhere it was thought if one says: I swear to eat this loaf of bread to-day, the day, however, has passed and he did not eat it, according to both Johanan and Resh Lakish stripes do not apply. However, their reasons are different. The reason of the former is that there is no manual act, and the reason of the latter is that the warning to this trans- 6 THE BABYLONIAN TALMUD. gression could not be of a certain, but of a doubtful kind (as perhaps he will still keep to his oath), hence, we see that R. Johanan's decision is that there are no stripes to a non-manual act, though contrary to the decision of the Mishna? R. Jo- hanan's above decision is in accordance with his rule, for it is in accordance with another anonymous Mishna, as follows: " I swear that I will not eat this loaf, I swear again that I will not eat it," and thereafter he did eat, he is liable only for the oath first which had made this bread illegal to him. (The second oath, however, is considered but an oath to keep his word according to the law, and such an oath is not subject to punishment.) This is an utterance oath, to whose intentional transgression stripes apply, and to an unintentional, a rich or ooor offering. Now, the expression of the Mishna, this is, means that only to such a transgression which is of a past nature stripes apply, but not to a transgression of a future nature, e.g.^ I will eat, etc., hence this Mishna, which is also anonymous, is in accordance with R. Johanan's opinion. But let us see; both Mishnaioth are anonymous, why, then, should R. Johanan choose the last one and not the first? Ac- cording to this question, you also may ask: Why did Rabbi (editor of the Mishna) insert such two contradictory Mishnaioth?