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That ruling that teaches the increased liability could not be the opinion either of Rabbi Ishmael, nor of Rabbi Akiva. It could not belong to Rabbi Ishmael, because he says that one can be liable only for oaths that concern the future, not ones that are about the past.
Why could it not be the opinion of Rabbi Akiva? The other part of the “two that are four” ruling says this: “There are two types of awareness of impurity that are really four. One can forget that he is impure and eat sacrifices or enter the Temple – these are two. The other two are when one remembers that he is impure, but forgets that these are sacrifices that he is eating, or that it is the Temple area that he is entering.” We know however that Rabbi Akiva does not make one liable for the second type of unawareness.
Counter-argument:
We could still say that the ruling is in agreement with both Rabbi Ismael and Rabbi Akiva, but that for the other two transgressions one is not liable to bring a sacrifice, but only to receive lashes.
Art: Isidor Kaufmann - Discussing The Talmud
Oaths can be of two types: to do something, or not to do it. For example, “I will eat this bread” or “I will not eat this bread.” These are the oaths explicitly mentioned in the Torah. However, one can derive the same two types of oaths as related to the past, where the person swears that he did something, or didn't do it. All four types, if made inadvertently, require the offender to bring a variable-type offering, which depends on his means.
(Here the Talmud digresses from oaths to discuss other cases of “two that are in reality four.” It will not come back to oaths until after eighteen pages.)
But why study oaths right after Makkot (lashes)? Because one of the last subjects in Makkot was multiple penalties for one transgression, and “two that are four” is formulated similarly.
Art: Isaac Luttichuys - Still Life with Bread and Wine Glass
The total number of commandments in the Torah is 613. This can also be seen from the verse “Moses commanded us the Torah as inheritance”. The numerical value of the word Torah is 611, plus the two commandments pronounced by God Himself make up 613.
King David established 11 ethical and moral requirements on which to base the 613.
Isaiah came and established them on six: “Walk with righteousness, speak with fairness, spurn extortionate profit, avoid suspicions of taking a bribe, seal the ears from hearing of bloodshed, and shut the eyes from seeing evil.”
Michah established them on three: do justice, love kindness, and walk humbly with your God.
Habakkuk established them on one: “The righteous person shall live through his faith”.
Art: John Everett Millais - North-West Passage
Excision (karet) is also translated as being cut off. One opinion is that it entails both the premature death of the sinner and the loss of his future generations. “Premature death” is death at the ages of fifty through fifty-nine, or even at the ages of sixty through seventy-nine if the death is sudden.
Rabbi Chananya ben Gamliel also said, “If a person who commits a single transgression punishable by being cutoff forfeits his life, then if he performs a single mitzvah, how much more so should his life be given to him.”
Rabbi Shimon says that you can derive this better. The verses say, “My laws by which you shall live … The souls that do incest will be cut off.” We see from here that whoever desists and does not do a transgression is given a reward of the one who performs a mitzvah.
Art: David The Younger Teniers - The Happy Soldier
The attendant of the court binds his hands on either side of the post, grasps his garments and pulls them away from the area to be lashed, and if they tear, they tear. A stone is placed behind the one being lashed, and the attendant stands on it with the strap in his hand. The whip is made of two calfskin straps with additional straps of donkey hide; the whip's handle is one hand-breadth, and the length of it is such that its tip should reach the beginning of the stomach when he is lashed across his back.
The reader reads appropriate verses to him. If he died as the result of lashing, the attendant is not liable, but if the attendant gave an extra blow and he died, the attendant goes into exile like all who kill by mistake. If the lashed one lost control of his bodily functions and soiled himself, he is exempt from any further lashes.
Art: Bartholomeus Molenaer - A Wife Beating her Husband
If a nazir was drinking wine all day, he receives only one set of lashes, following the first warning in the morning. If they kept warning him, and he kept drinking, he is liable for each warning. Similarly, if he was in the cemetery all day, he receives one set of lashes, but if they warned him against every entry, he is liable every time. If he was shaving his head all day, he is liable once, but if they warned him about every hair, he is liable every time.
There is a case where one plows a single furrow and is liable for eight prohibitions: if he plows with an ox and a donkey, and they are consecrated, and he covers mixed species in a vineyard, and he does so on a Sabbatical years and on a Yom Tov; and he is both a Kohen and a nazir, plowing in a cemetery.
Art: Karel van III Mander - A young man drinking from a silver tankard
These include: one who makes a bald spot on his head in mourning for a dead person; one who rounds (shaves off) the corner of his head; one who destroy the corner of his beard with a razor; one who in anguish makes a single cut in his flesh over a deceased person.
One who makes a single cut over five dead people, or one who makes five cuts over one dead person – is liable for lashes for each dead person and for each cut.
For rounding the corners of the head one gets two sets of lashes, one for one side, and one for another.
For destroying the five corners of the beard, a person is liable to five sets of lashes. Rabbi Eliezer says that if he cut them as one, he deserves only one set. One is not liable unless he shaves his beard with a razor, but Rabbi Eliezer makes him liable even for shaving with planes.
Art: Peter Paul Rubens - Head Of A Bearded Man
However, this notion is refuted by comparison with the firstborn animal. Both second tithe and firstborn animals had to be brought to Jerusalem and eaten there. And, just as the firstborn animal can only be offered at the time when the Temple stands – because it needs to be sacrificed at the Altar – so too the second tithe can be eaten in Jerusalem when the Temple stand.
This argument, however, has an internal weakness: firstborn requires that its blood be placed on the Altar, which is a stringency that the second tithe does not have. Then how do we know not to bring the second tithe today? Only from the verse, “In the place where He will choose to rest His name – there you will eat second tithe and the firstborn animals.” Since they are placed next to each other in the same verse, they have the same law.
Art: Eugène Verboeckhoven - Sheep Returning From Pasture
But did Rabbi Elazar really say this? Didn't he say the opposite in the following ruling: “If one separated first fruit before Sukkot, and Sukkot has passed, and he didn't bring the first fruit, they must be left to rot.” Why is this? Isn't it because the owner can no longer say the verses over them? This proves that Rabbi Elazar considers the verses essential!
The answer is similar to the principle of Rabbi Zeira. For Rabbi Zeira has said about flour offering that it must be mixed, and even if it is not mixed in practice, this does not matter, as long as the volume allows it to be mixed. However, if the volume is too large for mixing, the offering is invalid. By the same token, one must be able to say the verses. Not saying them is acceptable, but not being able to say them invalidates the ritual.
Art: Ignace Henri Jean Fantin-Latour - Fruits and Flowers 1866
If one who takes a mother bird together with her young, Rabbi Yehudah says that he incurs lashes and does not need to send the bird away, but the Sages say that he must send the bird away, and does not incur lashes.
Rabbi Shimon derives through logic the prohibition of eating first fruit mentioned above, by comparing it to the first tithe, and on this Rava comments, “One whose mother is giving birth to him should pray that she should give birth to one like Rabbi Shimon,” and proceeds to refute his logic. If so, why the praise? Because Rabbi Shimon knows how to change the order of words to arrive at what the Torah really meant.
Art: Pieter the Elder Bruegel - The Peasant and the Birdnester
If one ate an ant, he is liable to five separate sets of lashes – two for eating creeping things, and three for land varieties. For a hornet, he is liable to an additional set for creeping things that fly. If one mashed nine ants and then added another live one, and the live one completed the volume of an olive, he is liable to six sets, the last one for an olive's volume of non-kosher meat.
The same law would apply for mashing one ant the size of an olive, but such ants are rare.
Art: J. Stewart - Study of different bees
For example, one proclaims, “An oath that I will eat this loaf today!” If he is warned in the morning that he better eat the loaf, or else he will receive lashes, this is an uncertain warning, because he may still eat the loaf later on. This applies throughout the day: he cannot be told with certainty that if does not eat the loaf now he will incur lashes, since he can eat it a while later. Potentially, he could be warned on the very last moment of a day, but practically it is impossible. In this situation, Rabbi Yochanan says that an uncertain warning is a legal warning; however, he does not receive lashes because he does no action. On the contrary, Resh Lakish does allow lashes even for no action, but Resh Lakish considers uncertain warning invalid. Thus, according to both, he does not receive lashes, but for different reasons.
Jacobus Vrel - Street Scene with Bakery
Rabbi Yitzchak says that for relations with his sister one is cut off, but does not get lashes. Talking about the laws of incest, the Torah repeated the prohibition of one's sister. There is a rule, “Exception proves the rule.” In our case, when incest with one's sister is prohibited yet again, on the pain of being cut off, this teaches that being cut off is the only punishment for it, and one does not get lashes. It then also teaches that one does not get lashes for all other similar transgressions.
The Sages, who don't agree with Rabbi Yitzchak, say that the Torah here speaks about someone who fathered two girls with his mother, then a son with one of the girls, and his son then had relations with the other girl, who is the now his sister, father's sister, and mother's sister – such a person gets three sets of lashes.
Art: John Singer Sargent - The Daughters Of Edward Darley Boit
In general, a person is liable to lashes if he transgresses a negative commandment, is warned a short time before his transgression, and verbally accepts the consequences of his actions on himself. The total number of such prohibitions is 207. The following list contains novelty points, for example, even though the ones in the first group carry the penalty of being cut off from the people, and lashes still apply:
One who cohabits with his sister, aunt, his wife's sister, or with a woman who did not immerse herself in a mikveh. A High Priest who cohabits with a widow, or an ordinary kohen who cohabits with a divorcee. A ritually unclean person who eats sacrifices, or one who enters the Temple while unclean. One who eats chametz on Passover, or one who works on Yom Kippur. One who eats meat of any animal that was not slaughtered properly, and one who eats unkosher fish, birds, insects, reptiles, and rodents.
Art: Vincent Van Gogh - Two Rats
If an exiled killer inadvertently killed someone else in that city of refuge where he resides, he is exiled from his neighborhood to a different neighborhood. If a Levite inadvertently killed someone in his home city, he is exiled from his city to another city.
If a killer was exiled to a city of refuge and the townspeople wanted to honor him, he must tell them, “I am a killer.” If they wanted to do it anyway, they are allowed. In the six designated cities of refuge the killer does not have to pay rent. The other forty-two cities of the Levites also serve as cities of refuge, but the killer who resides there has to pay rent.
After the killer returns home, Rabbi Meir says that he returns to the position of authority he had occupied previously, but Rabbi Yehudah says that he does not.
Art: Berthe Morisot - Orange Tree Branches
One whose sentence was finalized when there was no High Priest, one who accidentally kills a High Priest, or a High Priest who killed – these never leave the city of refuge.
One may not leave the city of refuge for testimony regarding a mitzvah, nor for testimony regarding a monetary dispute, nor for testimony regarding a capital punishment. Even if all Israel needs him, and he is like the general Yoav the son of Zeruyah, he does not ever leave.
If a killer left the boundary of the city of refuge and the redeemer of the blood found him, Rabbi Yose HaGligli says that it is a mitzvah for the redeemer to kill him, and everybody else is allowed to do so, but Rabbi Akiva says that it is permissible for the redeemer, and everybody else is liable to death for killing him.
Art: John Opie - The Murder of Rizzio
The phrase “and he shall flee to one of those cities and live” teaches that we have to provide him with arrangements that will enable him to live. If he is a student of Torah, we exile his teacher with him, because a student cannot survive without the one who teaches him Torah. From here we see that a person should not teach a disciple who is not of good character. Furthermore, if the teacher is exiled, his academy is exiled with him.
Rav Chama used to say, “If God guides sinners on the way, He surely guides the righteous.”
Resh Lakish used to explain the phrase “but God caused it to come to his hand” with this example. Two people killed a person, one inadvertently, and one intentionally, but there were no witnesses against both. God causes one to sit under a ladder while the other one descends, falls on him, and kills him, this time with witnesses. One is thus executed, and the other one exiled.
Art: Isaac Snowman - Three Rabbis Of Jerusalem
An “enemy” is one who deliberately avoided speaking to the victim of “accidental” killing for three days. An “enemy” is not exiled, because he can't claim accidental killing. Rabbi Yose says that an “enemy” is considered forewarned and is executed. Rabbi Shimon looks at the circumstances of the case.
There were three cities of refuge in Transjordan, and three in the land of Canaan. Direct roads were constructed to facilitate getting to a city of refuge. The court would provide the accidental killer with two Torah scholars, and they would try to dissuade the avenging relative from wishing to attack. Then the court would bring him from the city of refuge and determine the degree of his responsibility.
Art: Pieter the Elder Bruegel - The Parable of the Blind Leading the Blind 1568
When one is killed by the “wood of the ax”, Rabbi Yehudah the Prince understands it as a woodchip , but the Sages say that it means that an axe-head slipped off the wooden handle. Therefore, if the victim was killed by the axe-head, Rabbi Yehudah classifies this as gross negligence, when the killer does not go into exile, because it does not help him, but the Sages say that this is exactly the case of the exile. If the death was caused by a woodchip from the tree that is being chopped, then according to Rabbi Yehudah the killer is exiled, but according to the Sages he is free from punishment, because the killing was inadvertent.
Art: Childe Hassam - Woodchopper, 1902
If two witnesses testify that a person was sentenced as a murderer by a certain court, and name the time, place, and witnesses in the case, that person is executed based on their words.
A sanhedrin that executes once in seven years is called a destroyer. Rabbi Eliezer ben Azaryah says, “Once is seventy years.” Rabbi Tarfon and Rabbi Akiva say, “Had we been on the sanhedrin at the time when they still performed executions, no person would ever been executed.” Rabban Shimon ben Gamliel says, “They would just increase the number of murderers in Israel,” because they would have eliminated the criminals' fear of retribution.
One who kills a person inadvertently is exiled into a city of refuge. If one was lowering a cask from a roof with the rope and it fell on a bystander and killed him, the killer is exiled, but if he was raising a cask and the cask fell and killed, the killer is not exiled.
Art: Arnold Böcklin - The Isle of the Dead
False plotting witnesses are liable only if the judgment has been pronounced, but the victim has not been executed, since the law is “do to them as they plotted to do to their brother”, and not as they actually did to him. Logic would dictate that if the defendant has been executed, all the more so the false witnesses should be executed, now that they have caused an actual loss of life. However, there is an overriding rule that one cannot derive capital punishments by logic – only those that are explicitly mentioned in the Torah are to be followed.
What does the phrase “by the word of two witnesses or three witnesses shall the one who is to die be put to death” teach? That the law of three witnesses is the same as the law of two witnesses: to be established as false plotting witnesses, all three have to be established thus.
Art: Bernhard Gutmann - Heads of Three Men and a Boy
Witnesses do not become plotting false witnesses, unless other witnesses discredit them personally. If they said, “How can you testify about a murder when this murder victim, or this alleged murderer, were with us in a different place on that day?”, they have attacked the testimony, but not the witnesses themselves. However, if the new witnesses said, “How can you testify about this event when you were with us on that day in a different place?”, the first witnesses do become plotting false witnesses and are executed on the words of the second set of witnesses.
If the witnesses are convicted as plotting false witnesses, they divide the monetary compensation that they have to pay to the intended victim, but if they are liable to lashes, they each receive their lashes. That is because lashes are comparable to capital punishment, and since there is no execution in half, there are also no lashes in half.
Art: Egbert van Heemskerck - Peasants in a Tavern
If two witnesses said, “We testify about this person that he owes his fellow two hundred zuz”, and they are found to be false plotting witnesses, they receive lashes for false testimony, and they pay their victim the amount they intended to make him lose, since lashes and repayment come from different places in the Torah – this is the opinion of Rabbi Meir. The Sages, however, say that whoever pays does not receive lashes, since a person cannot be liable to both lashes and monetary payment for the same crime.
If they said, “We testify about this person that he is liable to forty lashes,” and they are found to be false plotting witnesses, they receive eighty lashes – these are the words of Rabbi Meir, but the Sages make them liable to only forty.
Art: Jean Charles Meissonier- Two Men Talking in a Tavern
In this case, they cannot be made to pay the full value of the Ketubah, which they wanted the husband to loose, because he may have to pay her the Ketubah anyway, if he divorces her or dies. Instead, the court estimates the trade value of the Ketubah, that is, how much would someone be willing to pay for that woman's Ketubah, on the understanding that he may not get the payment at all, and the false witnesses pay this amount to the husband.
A similar case is where two witnesses said, “This man borrowed money and needs to repay it within thirty days,” whereas in reality the loan term was ten years. If they are found to be false witnesses, they pay the amount that a person is willing to pay for having the loan in his possession for the extra time, and this is not prohibited interest.
Art: French Unknown Masters - Portrait of a Couple
Two people want to disqualify a Kohen by testifying about the marital status of his parents. They come to court and state the following: “We testify about a certain man (who until now was presumed to be a qualified Kohen), that he is a son of a divorced woman. Later they are found to be plotting witnesses: two other witnesses came and ask them, “How can you say that you saw this woman being divorced, when on that day you were with us in a different place?”
It is impossible to apply to them what they wanted to inflict on the defendant, even if they are Kohanim. If we disqualify the children of the witnesses, we will violate the commandment of “do to them (but not to their children) what they wanted to do to him.” And if we do not disqualify their children, this is not right either, because they did want to disqualify the defendant's children. Therefore, they instead get the punishment of forty lashes.
Art: Diego Rodriguez de Silva y Velazquez - Three Men at a Table
Yehoshua said, “Cursed be the man before Hashem, who rises up and builds this city, Jericho. With his oldest son he will lay its foundation and with his youngest son he will set up its gates.” Chiel, a close friend of King Ahab, rebuilt the city, and the curse was fulfilled in him. Elijah came to console him, and Ahab asked if he thought the curse of Joshua was the cause. Elijah confirmed. Then Ahab said that Moses had cursed everybody who worships idols with drought and that he has established an idol on every hill, but in Israel, there was an abundance of rain.
Elijah immediately decreed a drought, and God granted it to him. Elijah had to run away to the desert, where ravens brought him bread and meat, and he drank from a brook. Eventually, the brook dried out, and Elijah was commanded to go live in Tsarfat. When the son of his hostess died, Elijah wanted to revive him, but God said, “I have three keys – from childbirth, rain, and resurrection. It is not proper for Me to have one, and for you – two. Elijah had to give up the key to rain, and the drought ended.
Rabbi Yose called Elijah an irascible person. Elijah hid from him for three days. When Elijah came, Rabbi Yose asked, “why were you hiding?” Elijah answered - “You called me irascible!” Rabbi Yose said, “So you are irascible again!”
Art: Childe Hassam - Rain Storm, Union Square
The inhabitants of a subverted city – that is, a city the majority of whose residents were subverted into worshiping an idol - are executed by beheading, and not by stoning, like in the regular case of idol worship. However, there are many preconditions. The subverters have to be men from this city, and not their agents. People have to be subverted and not decide to worship idols on their own. Each person needs to receive a warning with two witnesses. A caravan lodging in the city, if it was not subverted, saves the city.
The property of the subverted city's residents is destroyed by burning, even that of the righteous ones – for they should not have resided with such neighbors.
Art: Egon Schiele - Yellow City
Isaiah said, “Therefore Sheol (another name for Gehinnom) has expanded her desire and opened wide her mouth without measure.” Resh Lakish explained “without measure” as saying that whoever leaves even a single law unfulfilled is condemned to punishment in Gehinnom. Rabbi Yochanan said to him, “God, the Master, is not pleased with you saying such things about his subjects.” Rather, if one learned no more than a single law, he will be spared the punishment of Sheol.
Art: Jozef Israels - Grief Out of Darkness into Light
“The sons of Korach did not die” means that a place was set for them in Gehinnom, where they sat and recited God's praise for their salvation. Rabbah bar bar Chanah tells the following story:
I was one walking on the road, and an Arab merchant told me, “Come, and I will show you the site of the swallowing of Korach's assembly.” He then went and showed two cracks in the ground which smoked. He took a ball of wool shearings, soaked it in water, put it on the head of a spear, and passed the spear over the cracks, and the wool was singed. Then the Arab told him to listen, and he heard, “Moses and his Torah are true, and they (we) are liars”
Art: William Sidney Mount - School Boys Quarreling
There was a bird named Chol (possibly Phoenix) which Noah found lying in its quarters in the Ark, not outside waiting for food. He asked, “You don't want to eat?” The bird answered, “I saw how preoccupied you were, so I did not want to trouble you with feeding me.” Touched, Noah said, “May be it God's will that you will never die!” and it was fulfilled in “I shall die with my nest intact and live for many days like chol.”
Art: Theodule Augustine Ribot - Still Life with a Pomegranate
