004a – מאימתי – פרק ראשון – ברכות, ד ע”א

“Benayahu ben Yehoyada” — this is the Sanhedrin.^[1]

בניהו בן יהוידע זה סנהדרין - for he was the av beis din:

“And Evyasar” — this is the Urim Vetumim.

ואביתר אלו אורים ותומים - for all the days of David he would inquire through Evyasar, until the war of Avshalom, when he asked through Evyasar and did not succeed, and asked through Tzadok and succeeded, as we say in Seder Olam;^[2] and he was then removed from the kehunah:

And so it says (Shmuel II 20:23): and Benayahu ben Yehoyada was over the Kereisi and over the Peleisi.

וכן הוא אומר ובניהו בן יהוידע על הכרתי ועל הפלתי - first and before them; for first they take permission, and afterwards they ask whether they will succeed:

And why were they called Kereisi and Peleisi?

“Kereisi” — for they cut their words short.

שכורתים את דבריהם - for they say fixed and final words, neither taking away nor adding:

“Peleisi” — for they are wondrous in their words.

And afterwards, “the general of the king's army, Yoav”.

שר צבא למלך יואב - to lead the men of war:

Rav Yitzchak bar Adda said, and some say Rav Yitzchak the son of Rav Idi said: What is the verse?

מאי קרא - that a harp hung above his bed and woke him:

(Tehillim 57:9) Awake, my glory; awake, harp and lyre;

עורה כבודי - do not take your honor in sleep like other kings:

I will awaken the dawn.

אעירה שחר - other kings, the dawn wakes them; but I wake the dawn:

Rabbi Zeira said: Moshe certainly knew, and David too knew.

And since David knew, why did he need the harp?

To wake him from his sleep.

And since Moshe knew, why did he need to say “about midnight”?

Moshe held: perhaps Pharaoh's astrologers will err and say, Moshe is a liar.^[3]

שמא יטעו אצטגניני פרעה - even if I know how to pinpoint the hour, they do not know how to pinpoint the hour! Before midnight comes they will think it has come, and the plague has not yet arrived, and they will say, “Moshe is a liar”. Therefore it is good to hold on to the language of “I do not know”:

For the master said:

דאמר מר - in maseches Derech Eretz:^[4]

Teach your tongue to say “I do not know”, lest you be shown a liar and be caught.

ותאחז - you will be caught and stumble in your words:

Rav Ashi said: He stood in the middle of the night of the thirteenth going into the fourteenth.

תליסר נגהי ארבסר - the night after the thirteenth, when the fourteenth would come the next day:

And this is what Moshe said to Yisrael: The Holy One, blessed be He, said: Tomorrow, about midnight, like now, I will go out into the midst of Mitzrayim.

(Tehillim 86:1-2) Of David … guard my soul, for I am a chasid.

Levi and Rabbi Yitzchak.

One said: Thus said David before the Holy One, blessed be He: Master of the world, am I not a chasid?!

For all the kings of east and west sleep until three hours, but I (Tehillim 119:62) rise at midnight to give thanks to You.

And the other said: Thus said David before the Holy One, blessed be He: Master of the world, am I not a chasid?!

For all the kings of east and west sit in groups in their glory, while I — my hands are soiled with blood,

ידי מלוכלכות בדם - for the women show him niddah blood, whether it is tamei or tahor;^[5] for there are kinds of blood that are tahor in a woman:

and with the shefir,

ובשפיר - this is the sac of the fetus, in which the bones, sinews and flesh are formed. There is a shefir for which the woman sits days of tumah and days of taharah; and which is that? One that is formed; and in maseches Niddah (24b) it is explained. And there is a shefir full of water and blood, which is not considered a child for her to sit the tumah of a woman after birth and her days of taharah:

and with the afterbirth,

ובשליא - as we learned (Niddah 26a): “there is no afterbirth without a child”. It is a kind of garment in which the child lies, called in Old French vestidure. And it was taught (Niddah 26a): “an afterbirth is no smaller than a tefach”, “and its beginning is like a thread of the woof, and its end like a lupine”. They would bring it before him to see whether it had the measure, and whether it was formed as an afterbirth, so that we presume a child was in it and dissolved, and she should sit days of tumah and taharah for it, or not:

in order to make a woman permitted to her husband.

And not only this, but everything I do, I consult with Mefiboshes my teacher, and say to him:

Mefiboshes my teacher!

Did I judge rightly?

Did I convict rightly?

Did I acquit rightly?

זכיתי וחייבתי - this applies to monetary cases and capital cases:

Did I declare tahor rightly?

Did I declare tamei rightly?

טמאתי וטהרתי - in the laws of tumah and taharah:

And I was not ashamed.

Rabbi Yehoshua the son of Rav Idi said: What is the verse?

(Tehillim 119:46) And I will speak of Your testimonies before kings, and I will not be ashamed.

It was taught: Mefiboshes was not his name; Ish Boshes was his name.

And why was he called Mefiboshes?

מפיבושת - [from the mouth of shame]: in the words of halachah that came out of his mouth there was shame for David, for sometimes he would err, and he would tell him, “you erred”:

For he would put David to shame in halachah.

Therefore David merited that Kilav came from him.

לפיכך - in the merit that David made himself small, he merited that Kilav came from him:

And Rabbi Yochanan said: Kilav was not his name; Daniel was his name.

אלא דניאל שמו - in one place it says (Shmuel II 3:3), and his second, Kilav, of Avigail the wife of Naval, and so on; and in another place it says, the second, Daniel, of Avigail, in Divrei Hayamim (I 3:1):

And why was he called Kilav?

For he would put Mefiboshes to shame in halachah.

שהיה מכלים פני מפיבושת - “kol av”, he shamed the teacher, for he was a father in rulings:

And of him Shlomo said in his wisdom (Mishlei 23:15): My son, if your heart is wise, my heart too will rejoice.

And it says (Mishlei 27:11): Be wise, my son, and gladden my heart, that I may answer him who taunts me.

And did David call himself a chasid?!

[See Sanhedrin 93b]

But it is written (Tehillim 27:13): Were it not that I believed I would see the goodness of Hashem in the land of the living.

לולא האמנתי לראות בטוב ה' - they have already driven me away out of fear of You, as it says, for they have driven me out today from cleaving to the inheritance of Hashem, saying, Go serve, and so on (Shmuel I 26:19):

And it was taught in the name of Rabbi Yosei: Why are there dots over “lulei”?

נקוד על לולא - to expound the dots, which diminish the meaning of the verse, to say that it was not clear to him that he would see the goodness of Hashem. “Lulei” means “if not”, as in were it not that the God of my father, and so on, had been with me (Bereishis 31:42):

David said before the Holy One, blessed be He: Master of the world, I am sure of You that You pay a good reward to the righteous in the time to come, but I do not know whether I have a portion among them or not.

Perhaps sin will cause it.

שמא יגרום החטא - this is an answer: he is always sure in himself that he is a chasid; and what is in doubt for him is whether he will see the goodness of Hashem, because he feared that he might sin, and the sin would cause him not to see the good:

Like Rabbi Yaakov bar Idi.

For Rabbi Yaakov bar Idi pointed out a contradiction.

It is written (Bereishis 28:15): Behold, I am with you, and I will guard you wherever you go.

And it is written (Bereishis 32:8): And Yaakov was very afraid?

ויירא יעקב - perhaps after the promise I have sinned; and as it was taught, that sin causes the promise not to be fulfilled:

He said: Perhaps sin will cause it.

As it was taught (Shemos 15:16): Until Your people pass over, Hashem; until this people You acquired pass over.

“Until Your people pass over, Hashem” — this is the first entry.

ביאה ראשונה - when they came in the days of Yehoshua:

“Until this people You acquired pass over” — this is the second entry.

ביאה שנייה - when they went up from the exile of Bavel in the days of Ezra:

From here the Sages said: Yisrael were fit to have a miracle done for them in the days of Ezra, as was done for them in the days of Yehoshua bin Nun,

ראויים היו ליעשות להם נס - to come with a high hand:

but the sin caused it.

אלא שגרם החטא - and they went only with the permission of Koresh, and all the days of the kings of Persia they were subjugated to them: to Koresh, to Achashverosh, and to the last Daryavesh:

And the Chachamim say: until midnight:^[6]

Whom do the Chachamim hold like?

חכמים כמאן סבירא להו - in the meaning of when you lie down stated in the Torah:

If they hold like Rabbi Eliezer,

אי כרבי אליעזר סבירא להו - who holds that when you lie down is the whole time that people are busy going to lie down, this one earlier and that one later:

let them say like Rabbi Eliezer!

לימרו כרבי אליעזר - who said the end of the first watch; for certainly anyone who intends to sleep has already lain down and is asleep:

Tosafos

בניהו זה סנהדרין - he says this from reasoning. “Evyasar — this is the Urim Vetumim; and so it says, and Benayahu ben Yehoyada was over the Kereisi and the Peleisi” — that is, he was before them; if so, the Urim Vetumim came after Benayahu, and so Evyasar, who is mentioned after Benayahu, is the Urim Vetumim; so Rashi explained. But it is difficult for his explanation: it is obvious that Evyasar was the Kohen in the days of David, for there was no other Kohen, since all of them were killed in Nov, the city of the Kohanim;^[7] so why does it need a proof? And further, according to the reading of the Kuntres, “Benayahu ben Yehoyada”, there is no such verse anywhere. Therefore Rabbeinu Tam reads, as it is (Divrei Hayamim I 27:34): “and after Achisofel, Yehoyada ben Benayahu — this is the Sanhedrin; and so it says, and Benayahu ben Yehoyada was over the Kereisi and the Peleisi”; and Rabbeinu Tam explained that Kereisi and Peleisi are the Sanhedrin, who cut their words to their truth, and Peleisi, who are wondrous in ruling, like the mufla of the beis din. And if you ask: how does he derive Yehoyada ben Benayahu from Benayahu ben Yehoyada? One can say that presumably he filled his father's place, and just as his father was of the Sanhedrin, he too was of them:

Notes

1. 1. The Gemara continues to expound, phrase by phrase, the verse from Divrei Hayamim quoted at the foot of 3b.
2. 2. Seder Olam is an early chronicle of the history of Yisrael, attributed to the Tanna Rabbi Yosei ben Chalafta.
3. 3. Pharaoh's astrologers were his stargazers. Rashi on the Torah explains the same: Moshe did not say “at midnight”, lest Pharaoh's astrologers err and say that Moshe is a liar (Rashi, Shemos 11:4).
4. 4. Maseches Derech Eretz is one of the minor tractates, dealing with conduct and character.
5. 5. Some shades of blood make a woman niddah and others do not, and a Sage would examine the stain and rule.
6. 6. The Gemara returns to the Mishnah, where the Chachamim end the evening Shema at midnight, and asks which reading of when you lie down that follows.
7. 7. King Shaul had the Kohanim of Nov killed, and only Evyasar the son of Achimelech escaped to David.